False balance about vaccines rises from the grave...again

Imagine, if you will, a time machine capsule going all the way back to the earliest days of this blog, back in 2005 and 2006. Now consider the antivaccine movement, which somehow I became very interested in very early, an interest that continues to this day. Do you remember one theme that I kept hitting again and again? Besides the pseudoscientific quackery often promoted by antivaccinationists, that is? That theme was false balance. Back when I first started blogging, no matter what the angle of the story, when the press reported about the topic of vaccines—or the topic of autism, for that matter—the story would almost always contain a quote from an antivaccine activist or even full interviews with the likes of Jenny McCarthy. Yes, I'm referring to the false balance the press often provided on stories about vaccines.

Those were heady days for the antivaccine movement. It got to the point where in one sense I used to dread every April, because I knew that during Autism Awareness Month the antivaccine loons would come out to play. We''d see the likes of J. B. Handley, Jenny McCarthy and her then beau Jim Carrey, Andrew Wakefield, and various other luminaries of the antivaccine movement featured on various talk shows as though they had something worthwhile to say to juxtapose with what real experts say. In another sense, as much as I hated this, from a blogging standpoint I kind of used to look forward to April, because I knew I'd have stuff to blog about, but the false balance was irritating to me and many other pro-science advocates.

Then something happened. It seemed to coincide with the complete implosion of Andrew Wakefield's then lucrative career as the public face of the antivaccine movement, in which first he was stripped of his UK medical license, then his infamous 1998 Lancet case series that sparked the MMR scare was retracted, and then he was basically fired from his position as the medical director of Thoughtful House, the antivaccine quack clinic dedicated to "recovering" autistic "vaccine-injured" children. False balance started to go away. Oh, sure, it still pops up from time to time, but it appears to be much less frequent than it did ten years ago, or even five years ago. News stories do the "false balance" thing far less frequently, apparently having finally realized that in some scientific issues there are not two sides of an issue and that citing or interviewing antivaccinationists for "balance" is akin to interviewing geocentrists for stories about astronomy, HIV/AIDS denialists for stories about AIDS, or moon hoaxers for stories about NASA ande space exploration. You'd think that during a major measles outbreak like the Disneyland measles outbreak that's still raging the press would be even more careful not to give false balance to the antivaccine side.

Organizations that have led the campaign of doubts about vaccinations suggested that it was too soon to draw such a conclusion. The groups cautioned parents not to be pressured into having their children receive vaccinations, which the organizations say have been linked to other diseases. Health professionals say those claims are unfounded or vastly overstated.

“It’s premature to blame the increase in reports of measles on the unvaccinated when we don’t have all the facts yet,” said Barbara Loe Fisher, the president of the National Vaccine Information Center, a group raising concerns about inoculations. “I do know this: Fifty-seven cases of measles coming out of Disneyland in a country with a population of 317 million people is not a lot of cases. We should all take a deep breath and wait to see and get more information.”

A handful of doctors seem sympathetic to these views. Dr. Jay Gordon, a Santa Monica pediatrician who has cautioned against the way vaccines are used, said he had “given more measles vaccines” than ever before but did not like giving the shot to younger children.

“I think whatever risk there is — and I can’t prove a risk — is, I think, caused by the timing,” he said, referring to when the shot is administered. “It’s given at a time when kids are more susceptible to environmental impact. Don’t get me wrong; I have no proof that this vaccine causes harm. I just have anecdotal reports from parents who are convinced that their children were harmed by the vaccine.”

Oh, bloody hell! Citing Barbara Loe Fisher? Seriously? She's the founder of one of the oldest antivaccine organizations currently in existence. She's the friggin' grande dame of the modern antivaccine movement, and here the NYT is citing her alongside real scientists and doctors like Dr. Jane Seward, the deputy director of the viral diseases division at the CDC and Dr. Eric G. Handler, the public health officer for Orange County. As I've discussed on more occasions than I can remember, Barbara Loe Fisher spews pseudoscience and quackery about vaccines with the worst of them, having even collaborated with über-quack Joe Mercola.

The article gets worse than that, though. Barbara Loe Fisher wasn't enough. Oh, no. Next up, Dr. Jay, who's been getting his posterior handed to him in the comments of this post and this post. A week ago, he was being interviewed by the NYT and said:

A handful of doctors seem sympathetic to these views. Dr. Jay Gordon, a Santa Monica pediatrician who has cautioned against the way vaccines are used, said he had “given more measles vaccines” than ever before but did not like giving the shot to younger children.

“I think whatever risk there is — and I can’t prove a risk — is, I think, caused by the timing,” he said, referring to when the shot is administered. “It’s given at a time when kids are more susceptible to environmental impact. Don’t get me wrong; I have no proof that this vaccine causes harm. I just have anecdotal reports from parents who are convinced that their children were harmed by the vaccine.”

I have only one question for Mr. Nagourney and Ms. Goodnough: what the hell? If Dr. Jay doesn't have any evidence to support his viewpoints other than his confirmation bias-laden anecdotes to support his "concerns" that vaccines are given at a time when kids are susceptible to environmental impact and that the MMR vaccine causes harm. He even knows that there's no scientific evidence, but he keeps repeating the same information that's not just wrong but spectacularly wrong.

It's a painful interview to watch. Worse, Dr. Jay pulls the old antivaccine trick of trying to convince CBS viewers that the measles is no big deal. He out and out says that he doesn't think that the measles outbreak "poses any risk to a healthy child." Seriously, he said that. In fact, in response to a question about a child with measles walking into his office, Dr. Jay doubles down:

If somebody with measles walked into Dr. Gordon's office, 90 percent of the unvaccinated people who come in contact with them would get measles. I asked Dr. Gordon to explain how that type of contagion isn't a risk.

"You just said it, they'd get measles," Dr. Gordon replied. "Not meningitis, not the plague, not Ebola, they'd get measles. Measles is almost an always a benign childhood illness."

Ah, yes. Dr. Jay is repeating once again a variant of argumentum ad Brady Bunchium, just as he did four years ago. His arguments were dumb then, and they're even dumber now in the middle of an outbreak. As I pointed out, measles is not a benign disease, contrary to Dr. Jay's delusions otherwise. The past and present rebuke Dr. Jay for his delusions and tell him he is wrong, wrong, wrong.

We also learn from the interview that Dr. Jay has signed hundreds of personal belief exemption forms. In response to a question over whether he feels any personal responsibility for helping to bring measles back, Dr. Jay becomes even more delusional:

"Individual parents making that decision are not the ones bringing back measles," answered Dr. Gordon. "Measles isn't coming back. We have 70 cases of measles right now and we have 30 million Californians."

Yes, that's how it starts, fool. The number of cases can be zero. It should be zero. Measles had been all but eliminated from the US, until the last few years when pockets of non-vaccinating parents drove MMR uptake rates below the level of herd immunity in areas where the patients of Dr. Jay (and, of course, Dr. Bob) live. The elimination of measles is an achievable goal, an achievable goal being undermined by useful pediatrician idiots to the antivaccine movement like Dr. Jay. Yes, that's not Respectful Insolence. It's not-so-Respectful Insolence, but it's what Dr. Jay deserves right now.

Indeed, if you don't believe me, then check out Dr. Jay's Twitter feed. I did, and I was utterly appalled at his recent activity. Take a look:

important to say, no one will believe us
We have to stop telling people that this is a dangerous outbreak with death around every corner

Which is, of course, an example of Dr. Jay's monumental ignorance on the topic of measles. After all, it's not the overall vaccination rate over the entire state that predisposes to outbreaks. It's the low uptake in localized areas that drive MMR uptake down to the point where herd immunity is weakened to the point where outbreaks become possible. As I've said before, it's not surprising that there are outbreaks in California, because there are large pockets of unvaccinated children providing the raw material for such outbreaks.

Carl Krawitt has watched his son, Rhett, now 6, fight leukemia for the past 4 1/2 years. For more than three of those years, Rhett has undergone round after round of chemotherapy. Last year he finished chemotherapy, and doctors say he is in remission.

Now, there's a new threat, one that the family should not have to worry about: measles.

Rhett cannot be vaccinated, because his immune system is still rebuilding. It may be months more before his body is healthy enough to get all his immunizations. Until then, he depends on everyone around him for protection — what's known as herd immunity.

But Rhett lives in Marin County, Calif., a county with the dubious honor of having the highest rate of "personal belief exemptions" in the Bay Area and among the highest in the state. This school year, 6.45 percent of children in Marin have a personal belief exemption, which allows parents to lawfully send their children to school unvaccinated against communicable diseases like measles, polio, whooping cough and more.

Which has led to:

Now Krawitt and his wife, Jodi, have emailed the district's superintendent, requesting that the district "require immunization as a condition of attendance, with the only exception being those who cannot medically be vaccinated."

That's right. Thanks to antivaccinationists, aided and abetted by pediatricians like Dr. Jay Gordon and Dr. Bob Sears, there are parents of children with leukemia who are terrified to send their children to school because there are too many children with philosophical exemptions to school vaccine mandates.

This is what scientifically ignorant pediatricians like Dr. Jay have wrought. How pediatricians like Dr. Jay and Dr. Bob can live with themselves, I don't know.

I just don't know.

Most of all, I don't know what the hell CBS News and the NYT were thinking when they decided that Dr. Jay has anything of value to say about vaccines.

As hard as it is to believe, I've actually "known" pediatrician to the antivaccine stars (such as Jenny McCarthy), "Dr. Jay" Gordon, for nearly nine years now. It began back in 2005 when I first noticed him writing blogs full of antivaccine nonsense at the then-new group blog, The Huffington Post,…

Dammit.
I had planned on posting something else tomorrow that, because it had been posted elsewhere, would be minimal work. The reason, of course, is because it's the 4th of July weekend and today is a federal holiday. Unfortunately, sometimes things happen that I cannot ignore, even though all…

In the wake of antivaccine-pandering pediatrician "Dr. Bob" Sears' attempt to paint the measles as no big deal, so much so that it totally escaped his notice that it might not be a bad idea to recommend that the unvaccinated get the MMR vaccine in the midst of an outbreak, the bad news about the…

"Doctor" Jay is a fool. Sooner or later, an un- or under- vaccinated child will die, or worst of all, develop SSPE. Several have already been hospitalised.

“Measles isn’t coming back. We have 70 cases of measles right now and we have 30 million Californians.”

"Dr." Jay is making the rookie mistake of using the entire population to dilute the attack rate of measles rather than susceptible population. Or maybe not a mistake and just dishonest. I'm glad "Dr." Jay was given this platform to air his speshul beliefs, any public health official or physician up to their elbows controlling this outbreak who hasn't heard of him, will. "Dr." Bob is a little slicker and won't give interviews to anyone who isn't going to cast him in a good light.

it seems there's an over-reliance on serious complications being something like 1 in 100,000 or something "hundreds of thousands." But really looks more to me like 1 every 1000 - 3000. Not all that common, but not as 'rare' as his information is leading parents to believe. I guess my question is why aren't more accurate epidemiology reports getting deseminated to media? Maybe it's just not a sexy enough disease like fearbola.

"Dr. Jay pulls the old antivaccine trick of trying to convince CBS viewers that the measles is no big deal. He out and out says that he doesn’t think that the measles outbreak “poses any risk to a healthy child.” Seriously, he said that."

The American Academy of Pediatrics should be thinking about how ignorance of this magnitude expressed by one of its members reflects on the organization as a whole.

It's not just kids with cancer. There are other health issues that mean children cannot be vaccinated. A friend of mine has a child with cystic fibrosis - and there are thousands like her in the UK and US. Her immune system is too weak to take vaccination, so she's entirely dependent on those around her being vaccinated. A serious bout of infectious disease could literally kill her - no exaggeration. But I guess to the anti-vax bunch that's just fine if i's someone else's dead kid. They were sick anyway, who cares? It makes me so mad.

Dr. Finfer @11 -- As I said the other day, such a lawsuit would unfortunately be a thin silver lining on what would otherwise be a terrible event.

I heard that Dr. Jay was on the Diane Rehm show the other day (WAMU, an NPR affiliate). I haven't heard it, but there were actual experts on the show so I hope he was challenged.

If you haven't heard Diane Rehm, she's an excellent interviewer; she has a vocal palsy that makes her sound like she's about a million years old, and forces her to speak very slowly, but she uses this to her advantage -- her show can't become a shout-fest, because it would sound like the guests were beating up on a handicapped person.

I just want to say, as a former anti-vax parent, don't give up. Keep writing and refuting the nonsense. Thanks to this blog and SBM, my kids are now fully vaccinated.

There are a lot of logic-resistant whack jobs out there. Mostly though, there are scared parents confused by the scientific sounding numbers and questions thrown out by these doctors like Jay Gordon and Bob Sears that should know better. I mean geez, I know know not to listen to an actress, but when doctors bring up nonsense it's more convincing.

I was JUST having a Facebook conversation about vaccines last night with an antivaxxer. We were friends over ten years ago before we had kids, and remained acquainted on FB. During our conversation, I occasionally turned to Google when I needed to get a stat, or snag a quote to reinforce my point.I was really disheartened by how much gobbledygook I had to muddle through before I got to some real information. What can I do to help change this? Combined with the advertising the antivax movement is doing, I'm really concerned this wildfire is going to spread out of control.

But I guess to the anti-vax bunch that’s just fine if i’s someone else’s dead kid. They were sick anyway, who cares?

^This. Doctors Jay and Bob and their ilk keep going on and on about how the measles is not a dangerous disease for "healthy" children. I mean, that's a lie to begin with, but what about all the not-so-healthy kids out there who are vulnerable through no fault of their own or their parents'? It's just totally fine to watch them die, I guess. It's a level of sociopathy which I find nearly unimaginable, and it makes my blood boil.

I guess they're the type of people who believe that health is completely a personal choice, and if you aren't healthy, it's your own d*mn fault. Shoulda been eating more organic "superfoods!" Oh, you fed your kids macaroni and cheese last night? Well, you're just a bought-and-sold sheeple, then, anyway, so I don't care if you or your kids die. For yea, verily, the woos shall inherit the Earth.

Every time I think of the Brady Bunch I think of Marsha getting hit in the nose with a football.
Whenever I see Jay Gordon trotted out to tell people that all those vaccinations he never gave won't harm anyone, and "it's only measles" I think of hitting him in the nose with a football.
Oh, and Barbara Loe Fischer ? who interviewed her, Sharyl Attkisson ? Did the antivax contingent arrive at the studios in a clown car ?

Oh, and we now have 5 cases of measles in Arizona, thanks to people who had contact with people who got the disease at Disneyland. I see in the news Disney is planning a special 60th anniversary event for their park in California. Perhaps they should give out free vaccinations with every day pass bought ? MMR is cheap, supportive care for MMR isn't.

I actually read one of Dr. Jay’s/Sears’ books once, having innocently plucked them from a library shelf in the medical section (hah!). I had small children and rather liked the book at the time. The interesting thing is that when I questioned the family doctor about the vaxes, and he brushed off any ideas of harm from them, I BELIEVED him. He told me that “good doctors” don’t write books like that and I believed that too. Guess I was born skeptical--or a shill for allopaths! :-)

Dr. Jay pulls the old antivaccine trick of trying to convince CBS viewers that the measles is no big deal. He out and out says that he doesn’t think that the measles outbreak “poses any risk to a healthy child.” Seriously, he said that.

It's even more dishonest than it seems, really, since almsot everybody thinks of themselves and their children as "healthy" because they're not currently in the hospital and don't have any major health issues and get plenty to eat. Even the same people who think you need to be detoxing regularly don't usually think of themselves as unhealthy. But what does it take to move out of the "healthy" group and become more vulernable to measles?

Not a lot. Almost everybody gets a cold this time of year. if you're fighting a cold when measles comes along, you're not in the healthy group. Got food poisoning the day before you were exposed? Hey, you're not in the healthy group.

I have seen folks express a eugenicist bent, probably somewhat unconsciously, saying that maybe its better for the gene pool if the unhealthy die. They aren't bad people for thinking this way; they just haven't thought it through all the way. And this is because they're comfortable. People don't ask questions when they're comfy. And they're comfortable with this largely because of a conviction that they're not in that group. It's complacency.

So if we want to fight this complacency, perhaps we'd be better off not trying to invoke their sense of altruism and instead reminding them how perilously close they and their kids really are to being in that unhealthy group.

How pediatricians like Dr. Jay and Dr. Bob can live with themselves, I don’t know.

They have followers who keep telling them how great they are and paying them well for their advice, and anyway, they are not "someone who doesn’t vaccinate and who doesn’t adjust to new problems".
History is full of people who didn't do anything wrong. Heck, if they repeat it often enough, they may come to believe it.

Even the same people who think you need to be detoxing regularly don’t usually think of themselves as unhealthy.

You're right. Theythink of themselves as superhumanly healthy, precisely because they do constantly detox, eat "superfoods," and whatever else. They think of themselves as basically a separate species from those sheeple who eat "industrial" food and swallow Big Pharma's pills and yadda yadda yadda.

So if we want to fight this complacency, perhaps we’d be better off not trying to invoke their sense of altruism and instead reminding them how perilously close they and their kids really are to being in that unhealthy group.

The thing is, I don't think they can be reminded of that, or at least a lot of them can't. Because they're special, see, they're the wonderful high-vibration super-healthy New Agers who are going to survive the collapse of Western civilization and inherit the Earth. They are the elect and this is the new Calvinism.

Although it's certainly not as bad as what Orac has featured here, the LA Times had an interview in the editorial section of yesterday's paper with Elena Conis (I'd never heard of her before, but she's apparently an Emory University historian and has written a book about the history of vaccination) that struck me as being a great example of the fallacy of the golden mean. She described anti-vaxxing as being an outgrowth of the environmental and women's health movements, but used a lot of weasel words to imply that it's nearly as valid a concern as those are, and that if the paternalistic medical establishment would just start listening to mothers better the whole issue would melt away. Of course, I think everyone here realizes just how far from the truth that is.

Anyway, I'm not terribly good at picking apart opinion pieces like this in detail, but if anyone is interested in taking a look at the interview it's on the LA Times website under the opinion section and looks like it's free even to non-subscribers.

This week The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore had one of the shows on vaccination. He usually has a panel with people of differing views and at least one comedian.

They do a question thing at the end (one that usually has some dilemma based on the view point) and one of the Thinking Moms on the panel. Her question was if a vaccine was developed that would prevent autism would you get your kids vaccinated. She absolutely would not as it could not be trusted.

During the panel discussion part she did manage to throw out the how many dollars pharma companies make (which I think was the total profit as usually vaccines aren't that big a money maker for them) and the CDC Whistleblower meme. No one really counter either argument but it was more just let the drunk person rant at the party and don't engage as you don't want to give them any reason to keep going.

@JP, and considering that most of the "them" are consuming a low fat, high veggie, nutrient high diet, then they look around at the McDonalds/China buffet wide loads. They see themselves as the fit one and the rest of the rubes as the unhealthy one.

Sometimes entwined attributes cause problems in reaching the correct solution. The strong progressive cliche that I occasionally jam with looks by most demonstrative measures to be healthier, more fit. They are leaner, better conditioned and dare I say much better pickers and players. Thus, they are often "confused" that their choices are the best just because their outcomes are better than the general population.

Of course, I am sure both of us agree that the optimal strategy would be to follow much of the diet, exercise and lifestyle regime along with a sensible use and respect for standard medicine.

Liked your thought on "the new Calvinism", although I tend to use that term towards those that have obtained wealth and believe that shows themselves as God's favorite. Still, I like your usage too.

Sure, eating a reasonably healthy diet and getting some exercise are great things to do. A healthy lifestyle is no panacea, though, and it's not going to stop your kids from getting leukemia or you from getting that brain tumor or catching dengue fever in Thailand or whatever. Some of the health problems we fact in this nation are in fact a result of lifestyle, but a whole lot of "health" is just a result of luck. (One might also point out that people nowadays live long enough to experience "lifestyle" diseases.)

But hey, y'know, the parents who take their kids to McDonald's on occasion or rely on easy meals sometimes are not somehow lesser beings. I'm sorry, but when both parents (or the sole parent) work tiring jobs all day, it's not always possible to make a beautiful, organic, from-scratch supper. And a little junk food here and there isn't going to kill anybody, I mean, unless it's poisoned or something. (My particular weakness is fired chicken.)

But the super-nutty-crunchy types treat diet as religion, and they must remain pure at all costs. (Not all of them are progressive, either, by any means. Lots of way-far-libertarian views and conspiracy mongering to be found, as well.)

And Jeez, don't even get me started on the "Prosperity Gospel" types. They're as bad as the New Agers, and pretty similar in a lot of ways.

Isn't there another 'academy' of pediatrics, that's a haven for woomeisters and antivaxxers?

Last I checked, the case load from the Disney outbreak has just gone over 100, and approx. 20 of them are spread out across the country. America is well on its way to adopting yet another British cultural trend, to wit, endemic measles.

About Dr. Jay: I would hypothesise that the way he and his ilk operate, they look for little market niches they can occupy, where they can pick up a guaranteed clientele (at 170 dollars a pop) and gain fame (free marketing) by being 'spokespeople' for a 'point of view.' Pure distilled cynicism at first, until they come to believe their own horse stuff, and become True Evangelists for a Cause.

As for School Superintendent Steven Herzog, 'We are monitoring the situation closely...', that is just absolutely classic horse stuff, that one hears from witless wankers posing as management types, whether public sector or private sector. Someone needs to give him a full-strength dose of disrespectful insolence for that, followed by a disability rights lawsuit.

The thing is, I don’t think they can be reminded of that, or at least a lot of them can’t.

I think the ones that far down the rabbit hole of alt med are beyond reason. I'm thinking more of the everyday ones. I've encountered a lot of those on forums, people who are generally sensible but who think vaccines are unneccesary because hey, they're healthy, so what do they have to fear? They hear "only unhealthy people have to worry" and think of Bubble Boy. They don't realize that *everyone* is unhealthy at some point. Generally healthy people, strong, good evolutionarily fit people included. And the voices of people like Dr Jay feed that mindset. By dismissing measles as only something to worry about if you're "unhealthy", Dr Jay is riding that misconception. It's a bait-and-switch. He is saying one thing, and almost certainly aware that people are hearing something different.

Which is what most reasonable people believe and what data show...
HOWEVER those entranced by woo believe the polar opposite : that lifestyle choices pre-determine health outcomes for serious illnesses- by prevention as well as cure.

They believe because those who make alt med their cash cow ( even when they're vegans) preach the gospel of clean living/ veganism/ raw food/ phyto-nutrient loading/ natural, organic, GMO-free, vaccine-less purity.

People spend alarming amounts of money because they believe- in a denial of reality- that they can prevent most serious illness and increase longevity through these methods even though there is little evidence to support these claims.

As a psychologist, I venture that this is a way to pretend that one can control what are indeed the uncontrollable factors that affect health. I would add that particular individuals are most likely more vulnerable to these overtures by alt med salesmen. The claims advertised and perpetuated by alties filtre out reasonable SB people as a matter of course:
one offering a few years ago was entitled ( I kid you not)-
How to live forever.

And the rest of us- sinners all- are doomed or eternally dmned or something.

Even if it were true that measles didn't pose a risk to healthy kids, presumably it would still pose a risk to unhealthy kids. So, what, let's let the kids who are already unhealthy be extra vulnerable by dispensing with herd immunity? That's the mentality of a sociopath.

I cried yesterday reading that NPR piece on Rhett Krawitt. The fact that a little boy who has spent the majority of his short time on this planet fighting a sh!tty disease has to even face this fear fills me with rage. Thanks Dr. Gordon, thanks Dr. Sears. This is what your beliefs and practices have wrought upon kids like that victorious little boy standing so proudly next to his grade one classroom.

I'm ashamed to live in a world where we don't value the lives of ALL children. This is for NOTHING -- all of your fearmongering, all of your profiteering, your fame, your shoulder-rubbing with celebs -- NOTHING.

@JP Now, did I ever say that a healthy lifestyle was a panacea, or even a pancreas.

My point which is part of my theme, is that so many of the progressive/former commune types that I know are demonstratively healthier than hyper-obese no-vegs microwave only land walruses. Thus, the true effect of their other poor choices are often masked by the overall effect of multiple variables.

Almost a musing, about whom do you believe is being worse to their child, one that skips a MMR vac or one that allows their child to be obese. Yes, the worst case is an morbidly obese child with no vaccines and the best is a sensible diet fit vaccinated child.

I don't mean this as a dog of straw, I actually saw this in meeting a few years ago with the parents of a blimpo complaining about the dirty disease carrying river hippes. The irony made me leave the auditorium.

P.S. My own efforts to obtain a measles vaccination for myself are not going smoothly. I might need to be tested first to confirm, and the dang testing will be out-of-pocket.

I guess I was thinking that anti-vaxxers sort of have to be pretty far down the alt-med rabbit hole to begin with. I suppose you're right, though, there must be some fence sitters in amongst them, or at least some people susceptible to reason, given that Doctors Jay and Bob have had to be dissmissive of fears in the first place, and to start giving vaccines to worried parents and so on.

@Denice:

Funny story - I went to college with a guy who apparently believed in physical immortality. (He believed in a whole load of other BS, too.) He was also an insufferable git, but constantly wore this calm, beatific exterior which made it all the more annoying.

He was in a seminar once with myself and some of my friends, friends who I'm still close with, actually. Anyway, we were discussing an existentialist text on the fear of death, and he said, "Well, you only think you have to die because you believe in death." I was, for once in my life, speechless. He also used to try to find any excuse to bring any conversation around to raw foods and superfoods and blah blah blah. It was super annoying.

Anyway, I was up visiting my friend Andy a few years back - he lives in Madison, WI, now - and we were like, "Hey, I wonder whatever happened to that guy we hated and used to make fun of all the time?" He's down in NoCal now, livin' the life. If you wanna barf, you should watch this hilarious conspiracy video of his. He gets, like, a million points for unironic use of the word "sheeple" and for flashing a book cover by David f***ing Icke when he starts talking about "truth tellers." Oh, he also has an abysmally bad "rap" about raw cacao. And, of course, a website hawking expensive BS. Truly, I am ashamed to share an alma mater with this "man."

@Denice. Not just woo-sters. I used to hire a gaggle of bright young grads with the Master's of Public Health degrees freshly in their frames. One of the best and brightest of the bunch, dropped dead while on his lunchtime jog. The line I overheard at the funeral, and I know this was mainly the grief talking, was "He was fit, in shape, eat all the right foods, he wasn't suppose to die" .

I wasn't arguing with you when I said a healthy lifestyle is no panacea, I was merely pointing out what is, to me, obvious. Referring to people as "land walruses" does actually smack a bit of the attitude which I find so distasteful in the alt-med types, though.

Seriously, I think that to the faithful someone like me who exercises (perhaps 3-5 hours a week) eats carefully ( no red meat, lower fat, etc) and who has never been heavy would be considered just as lost as those who live on fast foods, never exercise, smoke and are quite overweight.

BECAUSE I'm not pure.
And I like a little gin and wine ( but not together)
And I occasionally eat cheese ((shudder))
some of which is blue/ bleu ((((((shudder)))))))
and I don't police food labels for organic, GMO, chemical-free ( heh)
and I eat chicken and salmon.

Dr. Jay Gordon during his television interview on Scott Pelley's nightly newscast is on record for this quote "Measles is almost always a benign childhood disease". Except when it isn't "a benign childhood disease", Dr. Gordon.

I posted the comment and the link to NPR's article about the six year old California child who is in remission after treatment for leukemia, and whose parents have appealed to the school authorities to ban those children who are not vaccinated with the MMR vaccine.

Just in case you don't believe that the AoA critters couldn't sink any lower, I submit to you this comment from Laura Hayes at Age of Autism...in reply to CIA Parker:

My thoughts exactly this morning! There is a story about a dad in Marin, CA, whose young son had leukemia, is now 6, and "cannot be vaccinated because his immune system is rebuilding." He now wants his son's school to bar all unvaccinated students to protect his son.

Talk about irony! Clearly, this dad does not know that it was his son's own vaccines that could very well have caused his leukemia! Vaccines contain known carcinogens, while at the same time, they are not tested or studied for carcinogenic effects. I know, WHAT?! Additionally, they contain many immune-weakening and immune-destroying ingredients, making recipients more vulnerable to both acute and chronic illnesses, cancer included. This dad also doesn't seem to know that any and all students and teachers who receive any one of the many live-virus vaccines now available are contagious and can shed that live vaccine virus for weeks, exposing his son to many viruses in that way. And now this dad wants other kids forced to get these same vaccines, or be kicked out of school? If only he had the knowledge needed to see this very real and very tragic irony.

Furthermore, another irony of sorts related to this story. Why is your child more worthy than the children of others? Why should others risk their children's health and development for your child's? As discussed in my article on AoA this week, both vaccines and illnesses carry the risks of disability and death. Vaccines are not some magic medicine that are always safe for everyone. Quite the opposite, as they have been legally declared "unavoidably unsafe", and have a lengthy track record going back hundreds of years which testifies to their ability to harm and kill.

If this man's son is severely immune-compromised and medically fragile (which is very sad and unfortunate; it is tragic what is being done to our children in the name of poisons for profit), then he needs to keep his son at home, in a protected and controlled environment. This is not unlike those of us who have children with vaccine-induced autism. There are many places we wish we could take our children, or have them go (i.e. to school, a friend's, or the store by themselves; to a sporting event, in which they are playing; to college; to a church service; to a paying job that would support them; to their own home one day where they could live independently and/or with their own family; and more), but we can't, so we don't. That is life. Each parenting situation is different, and must be handled as such. If your child is endangered by the germs of others, then exposure to those germs should be limited as much as possible by keeping the child at home in as clean and safe an environment as possible.

I thought Wilmore, overall, did a pretty good job handling the topic (so much so I included a bit about the episode in a recent post). I was disappointed, though, that no one called O'Toole on the CDC whistleblower nonsense, but was very pleased at Wilmore's rejoinder to the "but they're making money, the fiends!" [paraphrasing] comment.

Carl Krawitt made an interesting point in the story I read on NPR:
"Krawitt has been speaking up about vaccination for a long time now. He told me about going to a parent meeting at his daughter's school just before the start of the school year, where a staff member reminded parents not to send peanut products to school, since a child or children had an allergy. 'It's really important your kids don't bring peanuts, because kids can die,' Krawitt recalls the group being told."
If schools can tell parents not to send PBJs for lunch, surely they can tell parents not to send unvaccinated children to school.
California (and most of the rest of the US) should just do what Mississippi and West Virginia do, and say that the only exemption from vaccination is medical contraindication.

And I will say this as well: WHERE is the American Academy of Pediatrics during all this? WHERE?

A: NOWHERE. They are true cowards who used to once speak up against groups like the NVIC but now won't and have never, ever once done anything against the anti-vaccine members in their ranks--who all need to be expelled.

JP: It also makes no sense, cause walruses are found on both land and sea. I've heard of 'land whales' but I think the other is either a malaprop or a regionalism.
And of course 'Colonel Tom' works in public health. Since lilady's time, that's become a breeding ground of woo. Possibly because most of the people who work there tend to be the sort who think the heart overrules the brain and have an exaggerated sense of their own competence.

@JP, to my mind the phrase "land walrus" has no more negative connotations than morbidly obese, or type 2 diabetes. Could we settle on "dietary child neglect"?

@Denise Are you sure about the cheese? According to the "French Paradox" cheese might just be fine for you, although you might be talking the strain of vegetarian that eats no dairy. There so very interesting studies linking red meat to heart disease by way of digestive bacteria. So I've jumped on that "trend" too. , Although previously I only ate flesh that had been killed by my own hand. Although that was not a health reason. Can't do the dairy for obvious genetic reasons.

@JP, to my mind the phrase “land walrus” has no more negative connotations than morbidly obese, or type 2 diabetes. Could we settle on “dietary child neglect”?

Well, your mind works differently from the average mind, I suppose, which would classify one as an insult and the other two as conditions. It's obviously healthier to be at a healthy weight. That's a tautology. But throwing insults doesn't do anything to help anybody or anything.

I invite you to move to Detroit, and raise a couple kids with the average Detroiter's monthly income, availabe food choices, and transportation options. Really, I think it'd be educational.

I do think that not vaxing is basically medical neglect, but there's a whole lot more that goes into everyday dietary choices than the simple decision to take your kids for their shots or not.

@JP, point well made. Poor is bad for your health, and bad food is cheap food. The poor have a high hurdle, many bad things contribute to their plight. It is harder than for most, but being hard is no reason to stop trying.

One of my daughter's friends is extremely overweight, her parents are well off, in my mind's image that was population I was unleashing my small glib.

Shoot, next time I am up that we we can go grab a picnic on Squaw Island and talk the matter through.

@Shay, I am not now, nor have I ever worked in public health. My work was bought by an insurance company and trust me the insurance industry has nothing to do with public health. I said I had hired employees that had MS.P.H.

I was looking to see if Ben Carson might have been a member of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, but he doesn't seem to be, though AAPT seems to be very enthusiastic about him. The great Charlie Pierce began a column on Carson with

I begin to suspect quite seriously that Dr. Ben Carson honed his very legitimate skills as a gifted neurosurgeon by practicing on himself. I further suspect that whatever portion of the human brain is dedicated to the study of history is hanging on the wall of Ben's office, next to the diploma.

Thank you Herr Doktor, although even when things were really hard after my father's death, aged 38 from his third heart attack, my mother worked very hard to provide us with decent food and everything else. I likely think that her example of putting her children ahead of almost everything I likely have too hard of an opinion for those that do not. We all have some bias in our lives.

I miss her, she's two years on the ground now. Aortic aneurysm, she contracted MRSA during a surgical repair. They pumped her full of antibiotics and it took almost 18 months before the inevitable.

In the LA Times piece, Conis does have a point about there being some common ground between the women's and environmental health movements and the anti-vaxxers. But what she fails to appreciate is that it's a very confused common ground. Indeed, that's how we get people like RFK Jr. But most, especially on the environmental health side, should (and usually do) know better. After all, they have their own problems with science denial and the climate skeptics.

I like your characterization of "weasel words." The interviewer should have done a better job of framing the interview with an explanation of how Conis's "nuanced" view differs from mainstream, science-based public health recommendations.

I can tell you exactly what the CBS Evening News producers were thinking: The Disneyland measles story is hot hot hot, so let's find a dumb-ass SOB we can pin the blame on, serve him up on a platter, and dismember him with a meat cleaver in front of 7.1 million viewers, which just might help us gain some more ground on Brain Williams and Diane Sawyer.

The CBS News piece isn't 'balanced' at all, false or otherwise. It's a classic 60 Minutes style take-down of Dr. Jay Gordon. It's an audience-pleaser in dramatic form: a good guy, a bad guy, a twist, a reveal...

1) Introduce scumbag and let him state his BS: "measles poses no risk to a healthy child." (Dr. Jay is not a smart man. He doesn't see what's coming).
2) Put scumbag back on his heels with challenging 'but' question: "But a sick person who contacts YOUR patients will infect 90% of them. How is that not a risk?"
3) Stupid scumbag fails to realize his legs have just been cut off, and starts trying to dance out of trouble: "Measles is a benign childhood illness."
4) ...and he walks right into the knife!: "is it YOUR personal choice to bring back an eradicated disease?"
5) Writhing, twisting the blade further and further into his dub-ass self: "Measles isn't coming back"
6) And the ambush trap springs shut, pulling Dr. Jay off the screen: Animated graphic! Before vaccines 481,530 cases, 408 dead. And lets see a pro-vax Dr. now to show just how big a bozo has been swallowed by the mighty jaws of the edit bay! We'd seen Hollywood-groomed-guy Dr. Jay in his posh private office – in dress shirt, suit jacket and periwinkle tie — and here's Dr. Deborah Lehman at Cedars Sinai Medical Center, a woman in a frumpy outfit under a lab coat walking the halls of what appears to be real Children's Hospital ward...
7) Dr. Lehman starts moving her mouth and words must be coming out, but no one will hear them, as we're 3/4 of the way into the TRT of the piece, and that means it's climax time — Four Ken Burns Effect photos of kids in anguish completely covered with red dots. Benign my ass!
8) Cut back to Dr. Lehman for a few seconds. She's still saying something we're not listening to, as we take a breath to recover from those pictures of measles...
9) Which we do just in time to hear correspondent Ben Tracy pour the verbal dirt into Dr. Jay's lying-arse grave. The anti-vaxers have changed their minds, and rushing to Dr. Jay to get shots for their kids.
Boom goes the dynamite!
And the continuous thumping noise in the background since that clip aired is the sound of six figures worth of un-vaxers hopping down off the fence.

This is the news story of your dreams, gang. You may think you want scientists and doctors delivering the truth about vaccines with no time devoted to the likes of Dr. Jay, but TV doesn't work that way. No villain, no drama, no viewers. Put just Dr. Lehman on the screen, and the folks at home change the channel. Add Paul Offit, Steve Novella, and somebody from the CDC and it's worse: too many voices on screen, no focus. On the other hand, you might think if they're going to go after the anti-vaxers, they ought to debunk them more broadly, get Dr. Bob and RFKJ in there too. Nope.

Here's the classic 60 Minutes 'expose' formula: The star is the newsman-as-private-eye — tough, street-smart, relentless Mike Wallace. He's the viewer's surrogate, out to skewer the pompous fools that plague us in everyday life. The piece is a classically structured narrative arc portraying the lone detective's investigation of a single low-life. Plot is character, and character is plot. In order to develop character in a short segment, there's only room for two principals, though a side-kick of the week may step in to help lower the boom.

The bad guy falls to his own hubris. He thinks he can handle Mike Wallace. The crew is coming to his office. He's at home, not downtown in the police interrogation box. He doesn't understand that Mike has brought his 'box' with him. He can't tell what the camera's doing, but it's framing him in a tight close-up. Mike's more amiable in person than on TV. They talk for awhile - the interview might last a half-hour or more in real time. Slowly the questions become a bit tougher, and the bad guy starts to squirm. He's trying to catch back-up to that feeling of poise and comfort he'd had just moments before, and then... the (in)famous 60 Minutes "Gotcha" drops on his head.

The bad guy might even recover fairly well in reality, but his goose is already pre-cooked. Back at the shop, the producers/directors/editors chop up the rushes, pull out all the juicy stuff, and put it into proper story order, where the magic of TV lets 'Mike' pull out the ambush edit at exactly the right point(s) in the story arc — and here's the picture sequence SHOWING (not telling) that everything the guy has just said is a self-serving lie.

Good stories usually have interesting bad guys. Khan, The Joker, HAL. By themselves Kirk, Batman, and Dave Bowman are just tiresome boors. There's a high likelihood that Dr. Jay was cast in that the LA staffers know both Gordon and Sears, concluded that Dr. Bob would come off more likable on-screen and have a better line, while Dr. Jay would look like a weasel, and be far more prone to put his foot into his mouth. Per the script, which was already written in the sense the pro-vax info was already lined up, the humble science WOMAN (these producers do not miss a trick) already cast, the story outline already sketched.

Without Dr. Jay, you got nothing, TV-wise.

Now here's what Dr. Jay getting the 60 Minutes treatment should tell you (or re-affirm): the anti-vaxers are now losers. Not after Dr. Jay getting sliced and diced by Ben Tracy's video Vegomatic. Before. It was only on very rare occasions – e.g. the tobacco story fictionalized in The Insider – that Mike Wallace went after anyone with real power and influence. The targets were usually middling con-artists with puffed up egos: 3rd tier televangelists, regional snake oil salesmen, shady attorneys... yeah, Dr. Jay fits right in!

@Sadmar: I think at least some of the audience may assume that an experienced pediatrician's word should be taken seriously, and miss some or all of the takedowns and the lack of real, evidentiary basis for the claims.

That may mislead them into accepting his perspective as at least a valid one - even though it is unsupported. That's the danger of false balance.

I think that I've given more MMR vaccines since the Disneyland outbreak started than anyone you know.

Yes, you think they should have been given at 12 months. But, they have been given.

These are people who had never planned on giving the MMR before they joined my practice, learned to trust my conservative approach to vaccination and then accepted my advice that this was the right time to give the shot.

Dr Jay, DELAYING MMR vaccines is one of the worst pieces of advice that can be given and yet you give it. What makes you think you know more than the immunologists who determine what the vaccine schedule should be? Measles is seriously dangerous for the very young.

@Kochanski
Jay has been asked that many times and has even agreed that there is noe EVIDENCE to support his claim. only his years of experience. All of which leads to a huge outbreak of a non-trivial, preventable disease.

Among a specific group of people, delaying the MMR allows them to feel more certain about the vaccine and get it when they might otherwise have not. The risk to that delay is very small compared to the risk that coercion might lead them to never get the shot.

I believe that a serious proportion of people with measles this year are over age twenty years. A majority perhaps?

You've given more since the outbreak than anyone I know? A lot of shots? Since the outbreak? Now? Now is the right time to give the shot? For your healthy, affluent patients, now is the right time to give the shot?

Why was "now" not per the schedule? What basis do you have for recommending 3 years old?

Do you not get it? I don't understand. Either you don't get it, or you're being deliberately obtuse.

I keep going back to Dr. Jay's economic motives.....he caters to a select, well-to-do clientele who don't particularly like vaccines....therefore, if he ever came out and unequivocally supported them, as does the Pediatric Association to which he belongs, he'd lose his customers & his livelihood.

I can't see any other reason for Dr. Jay to mince words the way he does....

I seriously cannot believe that a pediatrician can be this ignorant. I have to believe you are just disingenuous. Too bad, I'd actually just like to believe the former about you, because at least it's fixable.

Dr Jay - FAP FAP FAP FAP, sorry you are just playing CYA now that there is an outbreak in CA. Doesn't matter if currently most of the individuals in this outbreak are over 20, outbreak gets big enough and INFANTS WILL START DYING. What about risk to pregnant women?

So, Dr. Jay is there to cater to the whims of those who might not be 100% anti-vaccine, but prefer to get their vaccines on whatever "mythical" schedule suits their particular needs.

I can certainly see the economic benefits to the Doctor - since he can spread vaccines over multiple upon multiple visits, each resulting in the standard fees to be paid (rather than one fee to receive multiple vaccines on time and such).

Probably the only other nice thing I can say about Dr. Jay, is at least he isn't (100%) Dr. Bob.

"Among a specific group of people, delaying the MMR allows them to feel more certain about the vaccine and get it when they might otherwise have not. The risk to that delay is very small compared to the risk that coercion might lead them to never get the shot."

Why are there only two options, delay or coercion? What about a level discussion of the risks and benefits?

I am not a scientist, but my immediate family is full of them -- doctors, nurses, a physicist, an engineer, an epidemiologist. I trust their advice on issues where I feel challenged. I had many questions as to why my daughter's ped didn't prescribe abx for her last ear infection and I went in to the appointment expecting a scrip. We talked about it at length and I understood his point and in the end, he was right, it went away on its own this time. Why can't you try to have the same relationship with the parents of your patients? Wouldn't that be the right thing to do?

I've asked this before, but you haven't answered me yet. You recommend waiting to get the MMR until 3 years of age. Delaying the first dose of MMR increases the risk of febrile seizures. It also leaves children susceptible to measles when they are at the highest risk for complications.

Tell me, Dr. Jay, why do you choose to recommend your patients increase the risks to their health? Doesn't that run counter to your oath and professional duty?

@Dr Jay, #71
As for Dr Chris (not FAAP), I am reminded of the Woody Allen/Groucho Marks (paraphrased) line, "I wouldn't want to belong to any club that would have me as a member." Your FAAP membership might seriously degrade the value of such a membership to Dr Chis.

It gripes my ass that reporters are calling NVIC and giving B-Lo a platform again, even if the intent is to use her as a punchline for anti-vaxx lunacy.

I think it would be much more interesting and informative (from both a health reporting and brazen infotainment perspective) if they instead used parents that don't immunize their kids as the sacrificial lambs/logic pinatas.

Gordon has "celebrity" status. For vaccinations, too many people are, unfortunately valuing the advice of celebrities over the advice from real experts. Jay Gordon (incredibly) believes he is an expert in infectious diseases and immunology, which he most certainly is not. His narcissistic personality has-- to the detriment of the health of his patients and public health in the US--led him to mug his faux vaccine expertise for any/every camera/reporter/blog he can find during his busy day seeing cash-only families. Gordon and Sears have made it very difficult for pediatricians like me--who actually understand the science behind vaccines as well as their clinical importance--to convince parents to vaccinate because when someone like a Sears or a Gordon says anything, it is taken as truth--thankfully not be everyone, but unfortunately by a high enough percentage to ruin herd immunity to measles in areas like California. Compounding this situation is the lack of any large group (AAP, AAFP, AMA, CDC, CA Medical Board) opposition to the insanely dangerous things spewing from the orifices of Gordon and Sears. Such opposition from these groups could have nipped this anti-vaccine nonsense in the bud.

I just was abusing *vegans*- for the most part- who think that cheese is the very devil itself and blue cheese is OBVIOUSLY just loaded with harmful substances/ critters- although these same people often love other microbes like that in sauerkraut, kombucha and yoghout ( non-vegans of course for the last). So go figure.

Some alties believe that raw milk is like unto ambrosia of the g-ds as well thus raw milk cheese is fine. See Mike Adams.

I think that most doctors and dieticians would approve of how I eat but most alties wouldn't.

After being quoted as saying in a CBS interview that he doesn't think the current measles outbreak “poses any risk to a healthy child.”, I would've thought Jay Gordon would be too embarrassed to show up here.

Jay has no shame, even after about one-fourth of the California victims wound up in the hospital.

It's futile to argue with Dr. Jay. His mind is closed shut and sealed in a concrete vault.

He's on Dr. Sears "Vaccine Friendly Doctors" list (code for doctors who do not adhere to the AAP Standards of Care for timely and complete vaccinations). He readily admits his ignorant opinions are not evidence-based and are based on anecdotal stories from his vaccine-phobic parents. He's been associated with virulent anti-vaccine groups for years and has not changed his mind, in spite of multiple studies which confirm that vaccines are safe and effective to prevent serious, sometimes deadly, childhood diseases.

He's vile when he slimes the members of the ACIP and physicians and he chases the TV cameras to feed his ego.

I think the problem with cheese for alties isn't so much the critters in it, it's the fact that it's concentrated dairy. Specifically, it has a huge amount of casein in it, which is bad, because reasons. (I mean, you sure don't want to live on the stuff, mainly because you'll never go to the bathroom again, but I digress.)

The most absurd argument agaisnt dairy I heard was that it causes cancer, because it was meant for baby cows and has enzymes in it that say "grow big" or something, so it makes you grow tumors. This was another time in my life when I was left more or less speechless.

As far as I can tell, with dairy, it's like this: it's high in fat and calories, but it's not unhealthy per se. Some people can't digest it, but those of Northern European stock like myself typically can, and I find it quite lovely, so what's the big problem?

I had never heard that about bleu cheese, although I love both the smell and occasional small taste of the stuff. I know I could take lactaid pills. I agree that I don't see the difference in a natural mold in cheese and natural buggies in other stuff.

There was a nice big new study, that I've glanced at the abstract, that indicates that three glasses of milk a day shows negative health outcomes, which does not shock me. No opinion on the validity of said study, but I remember it was done by a competent bunch.

The hypotheses of their being hormones in milk, I don't remember that from histology , they might be apocrine glands but I really don't remember that at all. I might have slept through that lecture.

Just lost my temper on the Vaccine Impact page and posted this. However, since the page is moderated, I doubt they will ever post it, even though I kept my tone (relatively) civil. So I'm cross-posting it here.

What crap. Talk to my grandfather about the "harmless" measles. As a family physician, he used to see lots of them. Ask my great aunt. Oh wait. You can't, unless you know sign language. She's deaf from those "harmless" measles. How about - nope, Dead from polio. I know...nope Died from pneumonia when she had chicken pox. Wait! I know! My brother. He's alive. Ok, he's sterile from mumps, but he's alive and well.

Dr Wolfson, you are so full of balogna, even if you don't eat it. A healthy diet is great, exercise is great. Avoiding unnecessary medications is great. I avoid them unless needed. But I wouldn't avoid vaccines.

Tell me, Dr, how do you explain to your 4 year old that her chicken pox are making her so miserable she can't eat, sleep, sit, lie down, swallow? You end up sedating her with narcotics so she can sip enough to stay out of the hospital with those "mild" childhood illnesses. How do you explain to the grieving husband that BOTH his wife and unborn child are dead from those "mild" chicken pox that killed them?

I know, I've heard it "obviously, they weren't healthy or they would have survived" or "they survived, didn't they"? How cruel can you be?

As for the "toxins" gambit - why don't you post what's REALLY in vaccines instead of repeating scare tactics? Why don't you tell people there is more aluminum and formadehyde in the paleo diet you recommend than in the entire vaccine schedule? Why do you have to lie about "aborted fetuses" (the cells came from fetal lines 60 years ago! They are not being fed by daily aborted fetuses).

I'm so tired of this crap. Fine. Take us back to the days where 1 in 4 children didn't even see their first birthday. Take us back to locking people up with quarantine signs on the doors so everyone knows you have an infectious disease. Take us back to watching your children die or be maimed for life at a MUCH higher rate than any vaccine ever caused. But don't ever expect me to give you any respect.

Sure.
I have no problem with cheese- it's the vegan/ GFCF/ TM crowd. It causes *mucous* I'm told ( and similar stuff to what you mention) and various ills and exacerbates symptoms of problems such as autism..

And since alties rely upon anecdata, I have a few of my own:
3 of the longest lived members of my family adored cheese. My late father even went as far as ordering desserts made with cheese. My late aunt usually had a variety of cheese around especially when she was quite elderly and didn't really cook anymore.

I just thought that the idea ( and image) of rich, luscious blue cheese would strike fear in the heart of any self-respecting vegan thus I include it along with gin and chicken,

@ChrisP: here in the US, DOs go through training very similar to MDs, with the variance being they also learn some manipulative therapies (similar to chiro quacks). Their residencies are usually the same as MDs, depending on the specialty. So I wouldn't say it's because he's a DO that Dr Wolfson is irresponsible. I would say it's just because he's lost any sense of decency he ever had.

As I live and practice in AZ where the anti-vaccine cardiologist also lives and practice, I filed a formal complaint with the AZ medical board against him, as did an Arizona cardiologist I know who was also aghast at what that clown said. Not sure if the AZ Medical Board will act, but it was the right thing to do.

My god, what an idiot Wolfsohn is. I'm impressed by the slobberfest in the comments area. Obviously, your excellent comment hasn't appeared. Nor has mine, not so excellent but short and snarky. Such a courageous fellow that he can't handle a little disagreement. I'm glad he's getting some heat. May it continue.

"I’m an ally and a “bridge.” The majority of people in this room are too myopic to see that."
In less greasy words," I've developed a really great cash only practice giving half of the available evidence to parents who are uncomfortable with the whole truth....and if I've protected the little kiddies years after their greatest risk from the morbidity of the disease, hey, it's all still good, right? You guys just don't understand what it takes to keep high maintenance parents happy.....haters"

Luckily for SoCal, not all the pediatricians are as grubby as Gordon and Sears.

I just caught the tail end of a segent on KNX, the LA news station. It sounded like a local segment, rather than a network one (although since KNX is a CBS O&O, it's available for the rest of the network).

What I heard was part of an interview with a doc, who sounded like a pediatrician, saying that she *will not* accept new patients of the non-vax variety. Good on her, and on KNX for reporting it.

"I think that I’ve given more MMR vaccines since the Disneyland outbreak started than anyone you know."

I suspect the only reason you are giving more MMR than anyone else during a measles outbreak is that, since you haven't been giving it before the outbreak, you have many more unvaccinated clients to give it to than anyone else has.

There is a kernel of truth in the fact that a good doctor knows how to address patient concerns in such a manner that parents do not feel so alienated that they seek care elsewhere. During my own daughter's mysterious illness (unexplained weightloss of 15 lbs, listlessness, nausea), it was greatly comforting the level of concern expressed by one of the rotating doctors at her PCP. I still disagree with her refusal to test for parasites but hey, I have my own microscope.

That said, patients should be steered away from silliness gently but firmly.

Driving home here in the city of the angels, I clicked on one of the local FM NPR stations, and they were doing the story about the father who wants his son's Marin County school to ban the unvaccinated. It was a repeat of the same recording that was played earlier.

So I clicked over to the AM news station KNX (mentioned above) and they were doing the measles story.

"All measles, all the time." This has been a media exercise in turning over a rock, and the conventional wisdom has moved to being pro-vaccination and anti-anti-vax.

Narad, according to Dr. Gordon, who appeared on the Scott Pelley Evening News Wednesday evening, he's provided hundreds of PBEs to his patients' parents. (That's another thing I wouldn't be bragging about).

Dr. Gordon claims to present complete information about vaccines and the diseases they present and also claims "the parents make the decision".

A ringing endorsement from Michael Belkin...wow, just wow. What more could the pediatrician to the stars hope for...unless it's a comment from AoA critter Nancy Hokanen.

Now here's a pediatrician who practices good medicine and provides excellent well-researched advice to parents. I especially like Dr. Roy Benaroch's explanation about the (non existent) passive immunity passed to infants who are breast fed by mommies who think breast feeding is a substitute for childhood vaccines:

Dr. Jay makes his patients feel comfortable with their "decision" not to vaccinate by speaking about how "mild and rare" measles is - I mean, the overall chances of their particular kid getting infected is incredibly small - so why bother right?

Then the parent turns on the news & see "MEASLES OUTBREAK" and it happens at Disney, a place where they might just have been planning on taking their little unvaccinated kids - suddenly it isn't so theoretical anymore....and they rush over to Dr. Jay & demand to be vaccinated. "Oh well, if that's what you want, I guess I should do it then," is probably his response.

Of course, in a sane person's world - he'd be setting up MMR shot clinics & sending out messages to all of his patients to get them up to date, just to be on the safe side.

Dr Jay is a shocker! If he isn't marketing supplements yet, it's only time before he starts. I'm so glad he wasn't here in NZ when my nephew had leukaemia. People like this 'good' doctor must feel OK with blood on their lily-white hands. I certainly wouldn't!

And in other news, JB has another mindbuggeringly stupid rant on AoA, in which he claims that news of a measles outbreak is great for anti-vaxers, and that wingnuts are so, so much cleverer than anyone else.

Mr Handley, can I introduce you to Mr Dunning and Mr Kruger? And possibly Mr Thickasfuck?

I'm hoping you can respond to this. In an article at cbsnews.com, you're quoted as saying

"This measles outbreak does not pose a great risk to a healthy child," said Dr. Gordon. "And quite frankly I don't think it poses any risk to a healthy child."

Could you expand on your reasons for saying that? In particular:
- how do you define "healthy" in that statement"?
- why do you say that measles poses no risk to a healthy child? What evidence do you have to support that?
- is there some test that could be done for apparently healthy children before being exposed to measles that would determine which of them are at risk and which are not? If so, how do you know this?
- is the health in this context a general thing or subject to rapid changes? If its subject to rapid changes, then isn't it prudent to assume that all children are at risk?

One might idly wonder how these figures compare with the number of PBEs signed off on.

Probably irrelevant as PBEs did not require anything other than the parents' signature until January 2014, and even then only for incoming kindergartners and 7th graders (unless the student changed schools in the 2013-2014 academic year).

Dr. Jay also opined on Twitter that we haven't had any measles deaths in 10-11 years. He put the cutoff so that the two deaths in 2003 could be excluded. Also, Dr. Jay, the reason we haven't had many deaths is because we haven't had a sufficient number of cases for that risk to loom large...until now. And the reason we haven't had enough cases? Vaccination!

So, Jay, when the next person dies of measles, which probably is sadly not too far off, what will you tell their family? That measles is not a risk? That their child just must not have been healthy? Will you take responsibility for your part in promoting the breakdown of herd immunity?

What my patients and parents say and believe do not typically influence what happens to yours. On the other hand, your celebrity parents greatly influence parents across the country.

Bob has the same kind of reach and influence with his book.

That has been what I have been trying to get across to you for some time now.

This doesn't just turn some no-vax parents into a parent who says 'ok, I'll get one or two shots.' It very likely turns many parents who you will never meet, who were just vaccine hesitant, into no-vax parents. And it has likely made others who would have been fine following the recommended schedule into a parent who is hesitant to have their child vaccinated.

Ms. Skye is a second-generation patient in your practice. I would be very disappointed if any of my second-generation parents had instincts that told them anything other than that protecting their kids from vaccine preventable diseases was best.

“This measles outbreak does not pose a great risk to a healthy child,” said Dr. Gordon. “And quite frankly I don’t think it poses any risk to a healthy child.”

That statement is beneath any pediatrician. Are the newborns that were exposed in the Fresno L&D ward healthy? Was the 10 month old that was exposed in Arizona with his 3-year-old sister getting chemo for leukemia healthy? Are they not at any risk? Or is it just a gamble that they won't have a serious side effect or even have a life-threatening case if they get measles?

If you go to the link for the Ben Tracy piece (just abve the embeded video in the OP) you'll find two more pro-vax videos in the sidebar, including one with a thumbnail image displaying 'Death Rate 1 in 1000. Complication Rate 1 in 3".

There's also a page layout version of an ambush edit, as Jay's "Measles is almost an always a benign childhood illness," is followed immediately by a CDC graphic showing measles is 6 times more infectious than ebola and 3 times more infectious than polio.

The page has a snarky headline, "Doctor explains why he lets kids avoid the measles vaccine" and the still image inset photo of Jay has to be the most smug-looking frame they could find in the story."

Down in the Comments, there's a good post from 'Dr Ts View ' on the lack of profit in vaccines, and for comedy gold there's a post from some fellow in Arizona named chrisphickie who is apparently "obviously a paid shill for the big drug companies" because he doesn't like Dr. Jay. ;-) ;-)

@ Mu #18: CNN isn't taking a stand. They're piling on. Which is good. Taking a stand would have been getting the foolishness of anti-vax on the front page before and outbreak. The story you linked has an effective peg, but the video is horribly weak. Just happy a baby pictures. The text and head on this CNN story aren't as punchy, but the video is MUCH better: http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/29/health/california-measles-outbreak/index…
Still not in the same league as the CBS piece...

"This measles outbreak does not pose a great risk to a healthy child,” said Dr. Gordon. “And quite frankly I don’t think it poses any risk to a healthy child.”

Todd opines: 'Dr. Jay also opined on Twitter that we haven’t had any measles deaths in 10-11 years. He put the cutoff so that the two deaths in 2003 could be excluded."
That was the last measles fatality Todd. You're repeating what I said. I sound like you're hoping for another soon even though I know that's not what you really mean.

@Michael Dochniak: I really do try to individualize the timing of vaccines with strong consideration of family history, allergies and reactions to previous vaccines. Most of those are inadequately studied. I do the best I can.

sadmar: I'm not sure what your point is. Vaccines are very profitable. Pediatricians probably don't give them for that reason but they maker money when they do.

I guess I'm just not seeing how a rate of serious complications from measles infection actually being 1 to 1-3 thousands instead of the perceived 'hundreds of thousands' gets readily dismissed. Unless evidence-based medicine shouldn't be followed. Gastalt seems all well and good running a ddx in primary care, but readily dismissing a known outcome from a disease process just doesn't make sense to me, even more so when that serious outcome is preventable.

"sadmar: I’m not sure what your point is. Vaccines are very profitable. Pediatricians probably don’t give them for that reason but they maker (sic) money when they do."

Really Dr. Gordon? You and your buddy Dr. Bob Sears are in the minority with your b.s. alternative schedules and your pandering to vaccine-phobic parents.

Tell us what profit you make when you do administer a vaccine. Be specific and include your cost per vaccine, office overhead, storage/wastage and the reimbursement rate from your patients' parents' health insurance companies.

So you reinvent the wheel from scratch each time with each parent and independently every time? Or just leave it up to parents to research when they are going to come in and demand you do something?

No telling patients an age range or expressing disapproval if they want it earlier than you think it should be given?

I mean you seem to have some ideas of no this before that age. If the parent dares to demand a shot at a given time do you have any recommendations for when a booster might be given, or just whenever the whim for that shows up in the parent.

@ Dorit #75
If the story was 'false balance' then, yes, by nominating Jay as an 'experienced pediatrician', worthy of being quoted in the news, he would granted some credibility. What had been described here as "false balance"* certainly exists in journalism, but it has the form of "objectivity". That is, the sources and only the source contradict one another. The form is [(A says X) but (B says Y)]. Critical Theorists of news have been on this case for half-a-century, and the consensus analysis is that the ideological problem is exactly that legitimation is granted simply by appearance in the news when the positions presented and the authority of the presenters are not interrogated.

That is "objectivity" calls for reporters to step back and pretend they're not there. But the audience understands intuitively that they are there. So when the reporter takes no position on the credibility of a source, that's a de facto endorsement. (In both print and broadcast, there are conventions reporters can employ to send subtle little "DO NOT TRUST" messages, so it's not quite that simple, but for this instance it will do.)

So what defines the form of an 'investigative report' is its difference from the vast majority of news items: the journalists are out in the open and issuing THIER OWN challenges to the source. For viewers with minimal cultural literacy in news/public affairs the form alone is a sign of de-legitimation, and they don't even need to understand the content to know the interview target is being presented as illegitimate.

The 60 Minutes style expose was developed by broadcast legend Don Hewitt in the mid-60s, and has been a staple of all TV "journalism" for over 45 years, so viewers are well trained in the routine. No one in the news biz or in journalism scholarship has the slightest doubt it "works". There a many serious questions about what kind of work it does, but those aren't germane here. Among the surplus of evidence you could find for how well this works is that among a viewing public that could care less about news in general, 60 Minutes became the top-rated (and most profitable) show on television on the basis of the melodrama value of its exposes.

The point about the necessity of a villain in #70 is, frankly, undebatable after two miilenia of dramaturgy, but I gave poor examples of bad guys relevant to a 60 Minutes expose. Better would be the villain of the week on Columbo.

Communication scholars and practitioners are well aware of the phenomenon of "selective perception." But, trust me – as I speak not for me but for the consensus of a field on a subject that has been researched to death – NO ONE who is not already an anti-vax partisan, and/or did not already know Jay Gordon and consider him a legitimate source came away from Ben Tracy's piece with the impression Jay's position is valid, or, more importantly, that HE is a valid source on anything.

Now, the audience may well miss the substance of the take-downs. That is, if you tested viewers on what exactly is wrong with Dr. Jay's position in terms of specifics, they might not do so well. What they will have stored is that measles really sucks, it's coming back, and this schmuck is to blame. That is, they don't miss that it's a takedown.

For example, one way a media researcher might evaluate a story like this is to do pre-and-post testing on "Is measles a benign childhood disease?"

"The lack of real, evidentiary basis for [Dr. Jay's] claims" isn't the issue – though it is on display passively. The evidentiary basis presented FOR vaccination is hardly thorough science. It's 2:25 of TV time, not a research paper. What it goes at is Dr. Jay's argument, not his evidence. Look at the story structure again.

J: measles poses no risk
B: How is 90% infection rate not a risk?
J: Measles is benign
B: Why bring back any eradicated disease?
J: Measles isn’t coming back
AMBUSH EDIT: Measles IS coming back, and do these pictures look benign to you? Heck, no.

That's the take-away. It's TV. It's about pictures. I this case it's about (excuse the bad pun) connecting the spots. The next time the viewers visualize that horrible rash they see Jay Gordon's smug face in their mind and hear echoes of his flailing backtracking — even though they don't remember the words, they remember the weaseling tone. The next time the viewers read about some 'vax-hesitant' MD who signs lots of exemption forms, they will see and hear the smug, weaselly Dr. Jay in their mind, and that will bring up those pictures of the poor kids suffering.

You don't anything deeper than that from TV. If you don't get that what I've described is how the story actually works, and that any news scholar reading Orac's critique of CBS is either laughing out loud and/or face-palming at the silliness, there's really nothing I can do but add to the face-palm chorus. If you don't get that in 2:25 this story did more to push vax rates back up than the entire cumulative history of Respectful Insolence [which is not a knock on RI at all; Orac have BB-gun, CBS have Missouri-class battleship], I'm first of all sorry that you can't feel the comfort this story ought to give you, and second concerned that valuable lessons for the future may be missed. But those topics will have to be the subjects of a separate comment.

Todd opines: ‘Dr. Jay also opined on Twitter that we haven’t had any measles deaths in 10-11 years. He put the cutoff so that the two deaths in 2003 could be excluded.”
That was the last measles fatality Todd. You’re repeating what I said. I sound like you’re hoping for another soon even though I know that’s not what you really mean.

Jay, excluding 2014, from 2000-2013 we had over a thousand cases of measles nationwide. In 2003, there were two measles deaths, giving a death rate of about 1 in 1,000, which is what we know the risk of death from measles to be (except you, who thinks that measles is not a risk). In 2014, we had 644 cases. So far this year, in the first month alone, there have been about 100 cases. We will very likely see a measles death very soon.

And do you know why, Dr. Jay? Because of doctors like you who pander to the anti-vaccine movement and the vaccine hesitant. Because of doctors like you who say, "measles doesn't pose a risk" and that "measles is benign". You contribute to the deterioration of herd immunity. You contribute to increased sickness, Jay, when as a physician your first duty is to prevent sickness, not treat it once it's already here. Your duty, doctor, is to vaccinate kids on schedule so that we do not have outbreaks in the first place.

Now, Jay, answer me. When the next person dies of measles, what will you tell their family? That measles is not a risk? That their child just must not have been healthy? Will you take responsibility for your part in promoting the breakdown of herd immunity?

I don't want anyone to die from measles. That's why I advocate for the prevention of the damn disease, you self-centered, arrogant prick. (Oh. I'm sorry. Was that uncivil?)

There's seems to be some disagreement about whether these media appearances have

a) Created "false balance" and given my point of view credibility

or

b) Made me look like a friggin' irresponsible idiot and increased the likelihood that everyone will get MMRs immediately.

The truth is in between. I don't like taped shows. CBS and NBC filmed for 45 minutes trying as hard as they could to get a gotcha' moment. Both reporters asked the same question a half dozen times or more in different ways and finally found a sound bite that framed what I said in the worst possible light.

You're all smart enough here to know what I really do while at the same time finding variations on calling me "a scum-sucking pig who kills children."

Again, for whatever reason, I have gotten more kids vaccinated the past two weeks than all the rest of you put together. I'm proud of that. Sadmar . . . you're an interesting person. Let's sit a grab a coffee someday.

The point, Jay, is the tip of the boning knife you invited Ben Tracy to plunge into your stomach. The point is you are so clueless, you seem to think making a murky point about vaccines being "very profitable" (to whom? how? how much?) is some kind of defense in response to a post noting you an initial visit to your office costs $700. (Seven.Hundred.Dollars).

You also seem to think we don't know your prescribed delayed vaccination schedule requires three visits instead of one, thus tripling your take — or that we can't figure out a regular PCP giving an MMR brings in a heck of a lot less income than you do in an appointment with parents where you tell them it's OK for their kid not to get the MMR.

The point Jay, is that whatever chance your anti-vax ship had of staying afloat post Disneyland, has just been greatly diminished by the giant hole in the hull you let Ben Tracy smash open with your big, thick head.

The point is you have become a comic echo of this guy. . The point is I hope you keep opening your mouth, so I can keep laughing my ass off at the dreck that comes out.

Both reporters asked the same question a half dozen times or more in different ways and finally found a sound bite that framed what I said in the worst possible light.

Aww poor wittle "Dr." Jay is taken out of context again. For what it's worth, here is how you appeared, to rational people you looked every bit the arrogant, incompetent ponce we know you to be and bonus your stupidity just got a larger audience. To the mindless, selfish crowd you pander to, you just validated their foolish, false beliefs. How proud you must feel.

You’re all smart enough here to know what I really do while at the same time finding variations on calling me “a scum-sucking pig who kills children.”

You said it, I didn't. Altho' I wouldn't just stop at the killing part because there are more avoidable endpoints of measles infections that you are helping to perpetuate.

Again, for whatever reason, I have gotten more kids vaccinated the past two weeks than all the rest of you put together. I’m proud of that. Sadmar . . . you’re an interesting person. Let’s sit a grab a coffee someday.

You vaccinated children who should have been vaccinated years ago and you want a freakin cookie for that. I can't even begin to imagine what else you are "proud" of.

Only slightly OT- had a thought on the way to work this morning- Can we stop calling PBEs "personal belief exemptions" or worse, "philosophical exemptions." Let's just call them what they actually are: "I don't wanna" exemptions. It's much more accurate.

"lilady: The MMR costs about $50 and is sold for $100. I have no wastage. My overhead does not change because I give a vaccine. I do not receive reimbursement from insurance companies."

You run your professional practice as a cash/credit card upfront business model, Dr. Gordon.

"...The truth is in between. I don’t like taped shows. CBS and NBC filmed for 45 minutes trying as hard as they could to get a gotcha’ moment. Both reporters asked the same question a half dozen times or more in different ways and finally found a sound bite that framed what I said in the worst possible light."

Really Dr. Gordon? Then why do you do those taped TV interviews? Do you find them irresistible, because you're a media whore? Is that why you prefer personal appearance presentations with your colleague Dr. Bob Sears and the Thimerosal-fixated RFK, Jr. at premieres of anti-vaccine movies?

You've provided 35 MMR vaccines during the past two weeks to children who are over age three...which, by your own statements on TV and on the SBM blog...are more MMR vaccines administered by you during all of 2014.

Again, for whatever reason, I have gotten more kids vaccinated the past two weeks than all the rest of you put together.

Leaving aside the extraordinary arrogance in presuming that none of the regular commenters here are themselves pediatricians who may have had an upswing in parents requesting MMR following the Disneyland outbreak, there are two glaring holes in Dr Gordon's argument here.

(1) As already ably pointed out by Science Mom, Dr Gordon is, at best, playing catch-up after enabling his patients' parents' neglectful behaviour for years (decades?). That he's administered loads of measles vaccines lately is, in that context, hardly worth "you get a gold star, Dr Gordon".

(2) Leaving aside regular cranks, the regulars here steadfastly support routine pediatric vaccination according to the schedules of their own countries, which puts them well ahead of Dr Gordon in the "gets a gold star" race when it comes to vaccines, even if he happened to have administered more vaccines over the last two weeks than the average non-pediatrician commenter here. (Although lilady's #175 makes Dr Gordon's total sound rather unimpressive.)

Heh. Are you running scared now Dr. Jay, because your spectacular displays of chutzpah and hubis is being called into question...on multiple internet websites?

That's too bad.

Tell us why you "recommend" MMR vaccine should not be administered before age three (down from age four, two years ago)?

Tell us why your "opinions" about vaccines, which you readily admit are not evidence-based, and the anecdotes you hear from your select group of anti-vaccine parents, trump the collective knowledge of tens of thousands of researchers?

Those are government subsidized single doses and yes, that includes the cost of administering the shots. This is what people pay in the real world:
[http://www.kevinmd].com/blog/2011/04/adult-cost-vaccines.html

It's good that there's not an additional administration fee stacked on top, but no, I was citing the private sector column. I don't know why you're bothering to cite the 2011 adult MMR markup at CVS and Walgreens other than to demonstrate that you are grossly detached from the notion of "people in the real world."

Of course, if administering vaccines weren't such a novelty, you likely could have found a buying group. Or told your patients – who seem likely to actually have insurance – that they could pretty much go anywhere else and have the vaccine covered.

Did you happen to open the link you provided to Kevin, M.D.'s website Dr. Jay?

Kevin, M.D. provided the cost for a MMR vaccine administered to an adult, not a child. All childhood vaccines on the CDC/AAP Recommended Childhood Vaccine list are covered by private medical insurance. Oops, I forgot, your practice's business model is cash/credit card only.

There's no need for you to reduce your prices for any patient whose parents are uninsured or underinsured; you could become a VFC provider with all those vaccines you give away being provided free-of-charge by the CDPH. Oops, you would be subject to provider audits for those patients who are recipients of VFC vaccines.

One might idly wonder how these figures compare with the number of PBEs signed off on.

Probably irrelevant as PBEs did not require anything other than the parents’ signature until January 2014, and even then only for incoming kindergartners and 7th graders (unless the student changed schools in the 2013-2014 academic year).

If one reviews the CBS story, it notes that "Dr. Gordon has signed hundreds of 'personal belief exemptions' ...."

You're right that being open about one's identity is risky: more than a few** of Orac's minions have felt repercussions in their everyday lives and in their careers... thus they may not have started out using pseudonyms.

** offhand, of those present here recently, Krebiozen, Rene and lilady. A guy I know who opposes hiv/aids denialism elsewhere under his own name had quite a bad time as well so he made up a totally ridiculous pseudonym.

Oh, and you still haven't answered my questions. When the next person dies of measles, what will you tell their family? That measles is not a risk? That their child just must not have been healthy? Will you take responsibility for your part in promoting the breakdown of herd immunity?

Dr. Jay, I have a question for you from the perspective of a potential parent.

Based on "doing my homework" ahead of time, I'm leaning toward the idea of trying to find a doctor who will be willing to give my currently-hypothetical child (my husband and I plan to de-hypotheticalize said child within the next couple years) an extra MMR at 6 months because, though I understand the protection is temporary at that age, I feel that it's better than nothing, in the event of an outbreak between 6 and 12 months, and I feel that the probability of an outbreak is too high to just try to wait those months out.

Let's assume that I won't change my mind between now and then. If my child were one of your patients, would you trust my judgment and research, to the point of facilitating my wishes by providing the shots, if I told that I wanted my child on a personalized custom schedule consisting of the CDC recommendations plus a 6 month MMR?

I guess the incivility and threats are more daunting because I've had rocks thrown through my windows a few times and been threatened in other ways. I know that Dr. Gorski had people coming after him and had some discussion with Rene' about the same issue. I would never do that. You'd never do that.

You are correct.
Even worse, when you survey alt med - including anti-vax, hiv/aids denialism, dietary woo, etc, you find that there is an intricate mesh of multiple interconnections betwixt and between most of the major players.
I sometimes wish I could create a graphic to illustrate what my semantic memory tells me ( actually, I could but I'm lazy)

There were a total of just over 1,300 cases of meningitis in that time frame. That's a lot of deaths for 1,300 cases, more than the 1 in 1,000 we hear about. But, no, measles is not deadly. (Yes, I included viral meningitis not specified, making this more sensitive and less specific, but just look at SSPE deaths!)

Anyway, I've re-written Prof. Elemental's "Fighting Trousers" for Dr. Jay. I hope you all enjoy it more than Jake Crosby, who actually thought I was challenging him to a fight on a rotating platform.

***

Dear Jay,
Regarding your recent foray
Into the Epi business and the scene you portray,
See I don't normally approve of war games,
But "He's lying you" is what they all say

And by Harry, they might be right--
This is science, not an Elvis night!
Shelve this doctor impersonation,
Let it end now, it's impertinent waiting!

You seem a reasonable chap,
What you're telling us is crap
All words spewed from a crackpot
'Cause that's not proper, just not cricket!
Put away your vaccine schedule or I'll tell you where to stick it!

I've got super professors and fans that read me
You've got a granddad's demeanor, you big old weenie
Don't look around doc, I'm speaking to you
Roll up your shirt sleeves, Queensbury rules
Never test the skeptics with the cleverest wits
Let's settle this like gentlemen: armed with heavy sticks
On a rotating plate, with spikes like Flash Gordon
And you're Peter Duncan; I gave you fair warning
When this Bob Sears clone is performing
Scientists go home before he begins talking
A new career might be more rewarding
I'm a bright Brighton peer, you're medicine's Piers Morgan

I'm not seeing you at ERs or clinics with kids with mening
Dear doc, you're not worthy of this!
Sold out like Joe Mercola
Used for a meme
And that means you're banned
From vaccinating
Hope it's safe to assume you won't do it again
Set foot on our stage and get ruined again
Be out, Dr. Jay, I've set the egg timer
You're better off in your home, drinking on your recliner
Stop being so dense, trying to make amends
Yours, et cetera, et cetera, sincerely, and so forth,
Epi Ren

I've followed the anti vaccine movement casually over the years, but never really gotten into the details. The scientific consensus has always seemed to be that they are extremely safe and that their benefits heavily outweigh their minimal risks, and that was good enough for me. But I've been encountering antivaccers (I live in Portland, OR) and feel guilty about being underprepared for confrontations with them. The blog has been great, and I've found a lot of interesting information online, but if anybody has book recommendations they would be appreciated. Sadly, it seems the quacks and deniers are as overrepresented in publishing as they are on the net. I don't have a science background, but I have done some reading in the history and philosophy of science. Ideally what I'm looking for is something scholarly but geared toward an educated layman.

Well, thank you although I don't feel particularly 'delightful and lovely' today.

And about your question to Dr Jay:
I also wonder because I was a healthy child and still had a miserable time with measles - or so they tell me because I remember very little about it except the darkened room and being forbidden to read, write or draw ( which I always did at home) My much older cousin thinks I missed 3-4 weeks of school and that the adults were worried about me.

It was one of the 4 or 5 times in my life that I was ill enough to stay at home for more than a day.( Knock wood/ touch wood).

The problem I see with the 'personal exemption' is that a medical document gets signed off under a license but without a medical or evidence-based reason, and the cumulative effect of these exemptions allow the spread of a communicable disease that really isn't benign.

Dr. Jay -- thanks for answering. Also, in the interest of giving credit where it's due, for applying your principle that the parents' preferences come first to parental decisions which you might be expected to disagree with.

However, since it then seems like you feel that the role of a pediatrician is to go along with the parents, should I be able to buy vaccines on the internet, if I know what I want and am convinced I can do it right? For that matter, why would this only apply to vaccines -- should I be able to buy any medicine I want for my child, or even for myself, up to the limit of thinking that I know what I'm doing? If not, where's the line and why?

@Denice #168
I don't drink wine, or coffee. And I doubt Dr. Gordon would find a conversation with me a lot of fun. It's not on my 'to do' list, anyway, so he's safe there.

@MarkN #205
I think that puts it in a nutshell. The question is 'how do we change that?' Anybody think the exemption could be challenged in court, for example, such that exemptions would be limited to legit medical reasons?

@ Michael #213
Both the White House statement and the Reuters article display genuine "false balance". This is not a matter of who is quoted, but the language used. The vaccine science is definitive. The public health concern is absolute.

"Obama believes decisions over vaccinating children should rest with parents." This validation of the 'personal choice' argument is simply disgusting, and a failure of leadership in the face of a clear public health crisis.

“Scientists defend the safety of vaccines,” implies there's a valid thing to be defended against. "Urged parents to heed the advice of public health officials and scientists " casts science as just the advice of persons X Y Z, not a body of validated knowledge.

"People should evaluate this for themselves with a bias toward good science and toward the advice of our public health professionals," Asked whether people should be getting vaccinated, Earnest said: "That's what the science indicates."...The measles outbreak has renewed a debate over the so-called anti-vaccination movement... Some parents also opt not to have their children vaccinated for religious or other reasons. Scientists defend the safety of vaccines. Earnest said Obama believes decisions over vaccinating children should rest with parents. But he added that "the president believes that everybody should be listening to our public health professionals."

See, all that waffling, all those conditionals, all those deflections to third parties, are balance. And Orac is right about one thing: there should be no balance on this issue.

How about:
Parents have a social responsibility to respect the science and take the actions called for by our public health professionals," Asked whether people should be getting vaccinated, Earnest said: "Yes. It's their civic duty to prevent the spread of this serious and highly contagious disease"...The measles outbreak has renewed concerns over the the influence of anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists misleading parents with false claims and bogus "scientific studies." While some parents have been allowed to opt out vaccination for legitimate religious objections, "personal belief exemptions" have been far too easy to obtain, and been given virtually no scrutiny for their validity. Earnest said Obama believes vaccination is not a matter of "personal choice" or "parental rights". He added, "The pubic health issue is clear. No one has the personal right to endanger other people by by bringing an eradicated disease roaring back."

There were a total of just over 1,300 cases of meningitis in that time frame. That’s a lot of deaths for 1,300 cases, more than the 1 in 1,000 we hear about. But, no, measles is not deadly. (Yes, I included viral meningitis not specified, making this more sensitive and less specific, but just look at SSPE deaths!)"

I once had a theory that the Scienceblog Respectful-Insolence was like a deck of playing cards. Once the Joker's (e.g., Prometheus and Science Mom) are discarded, a truthful and respectable game begins.

I'm publishing an article in Feb./Mar., 2015 entitled, "United States Patents and Autism".

It's a comprehensive review of who has been filing patents with the word "Autism" in a claim. Not surprisingly, pharmaceutical companies dominate the patent game.

It is my opinion that pharmaceutical companies increase the incidence of allergy-induced regressive autism through vaccines and then try to exclude others, with patents, to relieve the symptoms of autism.

That's one of the most idiotic things I've ever heard - so, you are surprised to find the Pharma companies are in the majority for filing patents for potential pharmaceutical treatments for autism symptoms?

Seriously?

I knew you were delusional, but this just proves, once again, that you don't live in the same reality as the rest of the world.

Michael, just out of shear curiosity, who do you think should be filing the most patents for autism?

Strangely, I have found that people in the aluminum alloy business have the most patents for aluminum alloys, people in the petrochemical business have the most patents for petrochemical processes, the natural gas bunch have the improvements on the Haber process. My patent was on a heuristic data analysis tool.

You do know that anyone that could prove that such a vast conspiracy exists, that a Nobel prize would certainly be granted. As a profit center, autism is small compared to the loss of the acid blocking business which was nullified by a real researcher that proved most stomach ulcers were caused by a disease. How about the study that nullified the market for beta-blockers to reduce blood pressure, when diuretics were proven as effective and much more cost effective. Heck, what about the loss of market for time-released niacin?

Colonel Tom: MJD has an idee fixe about latex. Like vaccines, no one here on RI denies that latex can cause health problems in those who are allergic or sensitive. What we do deny is that contact with latex causes autism. Or that vaccines cause autism. Or that vaccines that come from vials with latex seals (very few) can cause autism. We usually just ignore him. Oh...and if you are really curious - you can BUY HIS BOOK (/sarcasm - he posted for weeks with that as the refrain of every comment he made.)

You... don't *believe* in autism? I don't even know what to say to that. But I can assure you that teachers are not "allowed" to make the diagnosis. From many IEP meetings I can assure you school districts will not provide services without a letter from a doctor.

MI Dawn, I suppose his have been some of the ones I've skipped over. The shear magnitude of illogic of being surprised that pharmaceuticals hold patients in their fields of interest. It brings to mind those that think the government is buying up all of the ammunition rounds or that there is a plan to disband the Marine Corp.

P.S. Full disclosure, I don’t believe in ASD and I certainly don’t believe in allowing school teachers being the one to do the diagnosis.

As a native Minnesotan, an irredeemable homer (how I miss Byerly's wild rice soup), I feel some remorse in being reminded by MJD that the Loon is our beloved state bird, and proudly so.

Loons are graceful in the water, awkward on land, exhibit great endurance in flight, and are at home in hardy climes. Their distinctive tremolo call is used primarily to signal distress and threat to other members of the community. Loons do not engage in conspiracy theories, conjure up fanciful threats that do not exist, or call out for no good reason.

I hereby issue my apologies to the Great Northern Loon, gavia immer, for defaming them by employing their name as a term for anti-vax loonies ('loonie' being derived from 'lunatic,' not the bird). It won't happen again.

For the uninitiated, Dochniak is neither a doctor nor research scientist, but does have a vanity-published book to hustle. The gist of his half-baked argument is this: His young autistic son was playing with a balloon at a party prior to his autism diagnosis. The child inhaled some of the the powder on the balloon (used as a dessicant and to separate the balloons in the package) and suffered an asthma attack, and was rushed to the hospital. Shortly after, he was diagnosed with autism.

According to Dochniak, the latex in the balloon and the stoppers in vaccine vials caused an immune response/traumatic brain injury and made the child autistic. Thus, according to Dochniak, autism is caused by latex allergy.

Col. Tom:
"I never said I don’t believe in autism. I said I didn’t believe in ASD"

Are you suggesting that the range of conditions along the spectrum should not have been lumped together as they now are in the DSM-5? That instead, the older distinctions between autistic disorder, childhood disintegrative disorder, PDD-NOS, and Asperger's syndrome should have been maintained?

Are you suggesting that 'high functioning' ASD is overdiagnosed, providing some sort of excuse for bad behavior on the part children who are not significantly neuroatypical? Or are you suggesting that 'high functioning' ASD is simply not a valid medical condition at all?
______________________

Having identified myself with the fine character qualities of my home state bird, I shall ask you not to elaborate on your reciple for slow-baked Loon. I wouldn't want lilady to get any ideas. :-)

While fully agreeing on the science of vaccination, I have some comments on the arguments used:
To me, a one in 3000 risk of measels infections resulting in additional complications does not seem to be a very high risk. What does 'additional complications' mean? When I was a kid, vaccinations against measels didn't exist. Those days, I was not aware of anyone being very concerned about measels, about 99% of kids would get infected, be sick for a week or two and that was it.
It may be true that unhealthy children may risk more serious side effects, but that risk probably also exists for all the other childhood diseases that are still around. Just eradicating measels does not protect these kids from all other childhood diseases.
Some childhood diseases are quite harmless when experienced during childhood, but may be very dangerous when encountered at adulthood. So if only 95% of people get vaccinated, the remaining 5% runs a higher risk of getting the disease at higher age because of herd protection. Shouldn't that effect be considered too?
About risk: life is very risky, no risk can be absolutely eliminated. The risk of dying from simple surgical operations is about the same as getting complications from measels. Still many people are getting surgical operations just for aesthetic reasons.

So yes, you should vaccinate your child, why not? But if you don't, why should that be really irresponsible? Yes, you may risk getting infected at a higher age because of herd-protection. Maybe that is more risky than getting infected a childhood. So the remaining 5% should be wise to vaccinate just because the other 95% is doing so. The real (and genouin?) benifit of vaccinating against measels is that parents save two extra weeks of having a sick child at home and not being able to fully concentrate on work?

An autism or ADD diagnosis/label can also give people a tool for understanding their experience. I have a friend who had to fight for their autism diagnosis; the doctor seemed to think that only boys are affected by autism.

I don't think my friend is "chained to" someone else's expectations: they're working on a Ph.D. in geology. But their dealings with day-to-day life are eased by understanding the source of some difficulties: for example, that stimming isn't a problem, it's a way of dealing with problems, and that sometimes showering requires breaking "take a shower" down into eight or ten discrete steps, and it helps to have made a list of those steps.

Ms. Blankert: "Those days, I was not aware of anyone being very concerned about measels, about 99% of kids would get infected, be sick for a week or two and that was it."

How do you know? Did you know the status of every child in your town from the time you were born until your twenties? Were your parents prone to tell you bad news about other children?

I remember when I was young that my mother stopped talking to another woman when I entered the room. All I remember hearing was "measles" and "sad."

By the way, there is a about a one in five chance of getting pneumonia from measles, it is also the most common cause of death from measles (which ranges from one in 500 to one in 2000). Do you think a high fever and difficulty in breathing to be good for children?

I agree that as a (european) child I may have been kept unaware of bad news about measles, but I also remember as a visiting kid at american elementary school, that US parents were more concerned with risk.

I do remember several occasions of kids dying from traffic accidents and other mishaps, not from measles. Maybe I was lucky. I found some statistics that mention (undefined) "complications" in about 1 of 2000 cases, not 1 in 500. Maybe those numbers result from getting measles at a higher age?

I am not an advocate of going through a disease like measles, high fever and difficulty in breathing are probably not positive additions to ones health. Unnecessary risk of death should of course be avoided.

I am only a bit surprised at the heat of the discussion. People seem to think the measles are as bad as polio or the plague with high rates of "brain damage and death" which I still find hard to believe.

But if you can choose between the cost of getting a vaccination and the risk of getting measles with or without its complications, it seems more wise to go for the vaccination, even if Dr X (or whatever quack) is advising against it.

@Vicki, diagnosis of ADD might also be based upon an less than competent teacher who passes on their recommendation to a district social worker for a kangaroo evaluation. The fact that the child scores 95 percentile on Duke Tip sponsored ACT test, etc, etc, is beside the point.

@Colonel Tom Again, I am dumbfounded that you seem to think school districts are interested in having *more* kids with IEPs, especially considering how hard nearly every parent of a special needs kid I know has had to fight to get services for their kids. Schools are certainly not accepting the word of teachers in lieu of a proper diagnosis.

Ms. Blankert: "I found some statistics that mention (undefined) “complications” in about 1 of 2000 cases, not 1 in 500. Maybe those numbers result from getting measles at a higher age?"

By the way, I was in the USA. Where did you find those statistics? How were they obtained, and was measles a legally reported disease?

Have you heard of the author Roald Dahl? Did you know what happened to his oldest child? It is the reason The BFG has a dedication in the front for her. If you don't then forgive us if we don't put much weight in your childhood memories.

@Emma Crew, that is not my observation. Could be it has more to do with the funding formula around here. My wife is from a family of educators, she counts a dozen teachers and principles in the set of people she shares at least one eighth of her DNA. They are the source of my cynical opinion.

People seem to think the measles are as bad as polio or the plague with high rates of “brain damage and death” which I still find hard to believe.

Well, it actually kind of is. Believe it or not, but assuming good access to medical care, measles and polio will kill about the same percentage of cases. However, measles is far more infectious, and while polio will kill only about 0.5% of people without access to respirators (to save those who develop paralytic polio), without such care measles will kill about a third. It's actually more deadly than polio, and if that weren't enough fun, it's also far more contagious. Polio transmits by the fecal-oral route; measles is airborne, and if you are sharing close space with someone, say in a doctor's waiting room, and you have no immunity, you have about a 90% chance of developing measles.

This is why measles still kills somewhere between 300 and 400 people every day. Because a third of all cases will die without medical care, and in the parts of the world where measles remains strongest, there isn't very good access to medical care. But read between the lines on that -- while in the West you're unlikely to die of it, that'll require time in the hospital. It's more than an inconvenience.

Thank you Calli Arcale, that was a well presented argument. I am tempted to pick at some of your technique but will mainly refrain. However, I must give you a large deduction of points because you were countering "as bad as polio or THE PLAGUE" . You failed to address the plague, and we should just assume your standard Black Death here.

Still, that was such a masterful presentation, mixing both emotion and facts. You presented facts, and then humanized them. Just excellent work.

According to Dochniak, the latex in the balloon and the stoppers in vaccine vials caused an immune response/traumatic brain injury and made the child autistic.

MjD says,

I've spent years trying to effectively communicate the hazards of NRL in infants products, and vaccines, and you just summed it up almost perfectly. The term "Latex" is incorrect, it should be "natural rubber latex".

For the uninitiated, Dochniak is neither a doctor nor research scientist, but does have a vanity-published book to hustle.

A very good review of the very bad science Dochniak is pushing was done by previous minion Prometheus, on his blog, A Photon in the Darkness. However, this is sadly only available on the Wayback Machine at -

Just checking back to see if Jay Gordon, MD, FAAP reappeared to answer any questions, but I see he's apparently turned tail and run. Funny how that always happens when he starts getting some hard questions posed to him.

"The huge falls in disease rates after the introduction of vaccination programs suggest that vaccines might just be effective". Julian

Unfortunately those claims are doctor's notification Julian, have you got any real evidence? I mean the last flu pandemic turned out to be an MGM production at public cost. Why on earth do you believe medical peer reviewed research?

Had a cast around and LOL, you actually have blogs on flu vaccine failure denial!
The only people who believe in flu vaccines are doctors and they get paid to deliver!
Same with whooping cough and others!
This kind of pseudo medicine isn't science, its PR

Hang on, did pop sucket actually claim that the last flu epidemic was made in a Hollywood studio? Maybe it was across the lot from where they did the effects shots for 9/11, and the model work for Apollo?

I see Col Tom and Pop socket are making my point about upper-middle class people for me. Both are snooty office workers, who assume they are a cut above everyone else (especially people who are the wrong color, weight, or class) have zero scientific training, and are soft in the brain.
Before life piled on me, I was going to point out that there are three varieties of people who work in public health: Shay and Lilady are of the sort who understood science. The other two sorts are the softheaded fluffs who rely on feeling and go into the field with bleeding hearts or for the brownie points, and then there's Col. Tom's coworkers, who are simply ambitious sharks who assume nothing bad can ever happen to them, and have zero sympathy or understanding available for other people.
By the way, Tom, I have ADD, and was academically gifted. I probably wouldn't have gotten through college without access to student services. Believe me, they don't hand out the diagnoses like candy. I assume your wife is just another shark.

The reason we have vaccine non compliance is because time and time again the same old excuses are trotted out to explain why vaccines fail. Wrong match, dodgy batch, patient mitochondria fail, incorrectly administered..........

Balance is to stop dictat, I and many other people object to random claims by doctors and pharma shills that we cannot live without vaccination. EBM has fxxxk all to do with evidence base. I understand that vaccine failure admittance would make your site look rather stupid, but that is part of rational debate.

Your stance reads like some militant imposition but I suppose we need little ghettos like this to let you vent to each other. Good to see that the same few are ranting away.

Well the 'highly qualified' have brought the financial world to its knees, bombed the fuck out of the middle east wasp nest and put the whole world's security into jeopardy and you guys are telling us that we can't live long healthy lives without your snake oil!

I ain't special, I am normal!

commenting on this little corner of hyperspace is like treading on dog poop. We must all stop doing it.

'And, what are your qualifications to post comments about vaccines and V-P-Ds' pants akimbo

thing is dalek, it isn't just me, there are millions of ordinary people who think vaccinators are complete wankers. They didn't queue up like sheep and take the medicine.
All those skilled highly qualified assholes who bombed the fuck out of the middle east wasp nest, brought the financial world to its knees. Next time there is a call up for war lets send Gorski over the top first, along with Narad, Her Docky.

Love it, touched a nerve with old Groucho himself. You don't like someone pointing out a hole in the 'experts know best card do you'. Well all that shit kicking off in the middle east is down to asshole like you, perpetuating nasty myths and quashing rational debate, same with the world money disaster - all highly qualified and nasty.

It's a good match for all strains but one: due to genetic drift occurring betweeb the time the strains were chosen, the vaccines prepared and the release of the vaccines it's not as good a match for the H3N2 strain. As a result it's about 57% effective against all strains circulating this season.

By what rational argument does achieving 57% effectiveness--reducing the incidence of infections by more than half--constitute a failure?

So all those highly qualified people who told us we were all gonna die from pig flu got that bollocks wrong. All those highly qualified experts that bombed the shit out of the middle east and destabilized the security of the whole world and brought the banking system to its knees, is it that kind of expert your are telling us to believe in?

Also, most people don't understand propagation theory. To really be simple, think of a room of set mouse traps loaded with 10 ball bearings. One mousetrap is sprung, releasing 10 balls. Of these 10 balls, they might hit another two mouse traps. So the first trap rapidly propagates until the whole room has been sprung.

Now imagine, that 63% of the mousetraps are vaccinated, or pre-sprung. Now one trap is sprung and instead of on average two more traps are sprung that only 63% of two are sprung. Instead of being a self-perpetuating chain reaction, a few traps might spring but the reaction peters out.

Since flu is so temperature dependent, all we have to do with the flu vaccine is to slow down its spread and we have a good chance of the seasonal epidemic weakening before the season is over. If nothing else, slowing the epidemic to keep health resources from being overwhelmed during the peak flu season is a very good thing.

So 57% effective does not mean that the number of people is reduced by 57%, it means that millions may not be exposed at all to flu, that hospitals are not overwhelmed. It means whole school systems and daycares and VA hosptials are not infected. Dang H1N1 almost was the death of me.

Tom, we all know that vaccine parody. You need a big imagination, I am interested in science not some schoolboy fantasy story. Considering millions don't get vaccinated for flu. Your mousey story is just a marketing ploy.
If vaccination worked and it was a good idea we would all happily queue up. Since we are not, it's back to the drawing board. vaccination is like politics, all bull and some people still think voting is gonna change something.

"...... Now one trap is sprung and instead of on average two more traps are sprung that only 63% of two are sprung......." Tom

Looks like you tripped up on your own bullshit Tom, what does this mean, or does it fucking matter? You so believe the story you can't even remember the details. Are you an expert in applied manure too?

So what percentage of those who didn’t get the vaccygoo didn’t get ‘infected’?

If one were to compare infection rates for unvaccinated and vaccinated, and the numbers showed those who were vaccinated were less likely to catch the flu (even if by let's say only 57% even though it's not that simple) would you agree that the vaccine does have a protective effect after all?

This rational conversation with scientists is getting boring, if you keep moderating everything I post and not posting it somehow it gives you a vaccinators' advantage. You see we have all worked that out, you bias the evidence, cherry pick the critique and then stay aloft in your ivory tower wondering why any rational person could come to the conclusion you are all assholes. That is why lots of people think that people like you are sick.

It is great knowing you have to read all this, not posting responses means you read it. LOL

Pop socket, why are you characterizing a 57% success rate--preventing greater than half of all flu infections--as a 43% failure rate? You aren't suffering from the misapprehension that we should expect vaccines to be 100% effective 100% of the time, are you?

Pop and Lock, the numbers do not matter much, either the rate of propagation is self-sustaining or rate of propagation is reduced. The example of where two additional traps are sprung is an arbitrary example based upon the configuration. In practice, a single measles case could infect dozens of victims, ala Disneyland.

If you could get better than even odds that if you bought a lottery ticket you'd win a powerball lottery, would you buy a ticket? How about if your health insurance paid for the cost of purchasing the ticket but you still got to keep the winnings?

Or would you look at it as being offered a 43% chance to lose and take a pass?

If someone does not believe that flu vaccines are valid, I find it hard to believe that I need to speak in anything other than very simple and basic concepts. As it has been predetermined that you do not have much of a grasp upon the subject, otherwise you'd not hold the untenable position that you hold, I find it useful to talk in simple easy to grasp ideas.

Even if the vaccine were 10% effective, than that decrease in the incidents and speed of an epidemic "wave" would be worthwhile. Again, some schools would not be affected, some areas of would escape, some people would not die.

As far as me being a "pawn" of the vaccine industry, I have no financial stake, I am retired, fairly well off and a cheap bastard. I have no vices except the occasional trip to the boat to play blackjack.

Also, I am fairly offended at your over familiarity to address me as "Tom". You don't know me, we are not family or close friends. You do not use the familiar first name in such situations. "Colonel" would be fine, as you could check with Ms. Manners to see that is the proper title even in retirement.

@Emma Crew, I praise the Creator that I was not in that number. I am still amazed at how hard the disease was on me, my heart function greatly decreased and did not recover. I'd not had to go on the diuretics, not gotten the pacemaker except for having the bad luck of catching the disease before the vaccine was available. The worst, if Daughter had to grow up knowing she'd brought the disease into our family, and that disease had killed her father. What would that have done to her? Shoot, according to the military I have sociopathic tendencies and even I can't stand the thought of spreading the disease that kills another.

P.S. Not that sociopathic tendencies are not good for certain aspects of military command.

'Pop Socket, I personally knew people who DIED from H1N1, so why don’t you f*ck off now.' Emma
Mismanagement of flu is an iatrogenic problem. Handing out antivirals is too, along with antipyretics.
There are plenty of people who have died from vaccination Emma and they believed that medicine would help them.

@Colonel Tom, one was the husband of a dear friend. He was a strong, healthy man in his 30s and she had to spend a miserable month watching as they tried more and more desperate things to keep him alive. After that year I started insisting my husband get the flu vax, too (he was being such a guy about it).

Luckily for myself I apparently had residual immunity to H1N1 from being a kid in the 70s. This recent go-round it ripped through a conference I was attending. I then spent seven hours in the car driving home from said conference with my best friend as she got sicker and sicker. I never had anything worse than "why do I feel hung over today when I had nothing to drink last night?"

The problem is that all the stats quoted here come from medical glad rags, we all know that's like asking Maccy D to give us a pointer for gastronomy.

None of the predictions for swine flu came real. Some countries did nothing about swine flu and actually had lower than normal death rates from flu and didn't invest any money at all in vaccines or antivirals. Did the people you know take vaccines, antivirals or antipyretics?

@Emma Crewe, Yes, I made it through the initial phase only to linger for weeks. It was a nasty strain.
.
It only takes a small amount of cumulative mutation to potentially turn "normal" flu into something like the Spanish Flu. My Grandfather was serving in WW1 and I've read his journal about his time he was serving under Black Jack after getting a dose of chlorine gas. His descriptions of healthy men dying so quickly from that plaque are disturbing "The reapers moves among the field, taking the healthy, the strong and those with pride. A cough becomes a gasp, and a gasp becomes a rattle. In the morning, we gather the dead for a burial unfit for a man""

If vaccination worked and it was a good idea we would all happily queue up.

Back during the H1N1 epidemics, I was around Toronto, Canada. One of the fhe first reported victim of the flu, the one which convinced us flu is a serious matter, was a young teenager. One week healthy, next week dead.
The week after, clinic centers all over the city were offering the flu shot and I remember how we were happily queuing up to get it.

gaist – if you were a balanced scientist you would also propose that if studies showed that more people got the disease that had the vaccine would you accept that the vaccine was bullshit?

I take that as a no, then. But if you've already made up your mind, why ask for the numbers in the first place?

And for what it's worth - if you can provide reliable numbers (regardless of source, as long as the numbers really are reliable*) that vaccine makes one susceptible to the disease people here would listen. So... Got any?

WW1 mythology. What was interesting was that the main group of 'fatals' was young men 15 to 34 and that was the call up age. Old and young people at home didn't succumb in nearly anything like the same numbers. My grandfather was at Ypres, Paschendale and the Somme and lived to 96. Breathing in the stench of rotting corpses and eating utter crap under the continual threat of certain death was the context. We now know that the reason so many died was because of mass aspirin poisoning, between 5 and 35gms to each with a fever. If you went to hospital death was certain. Emma you need to read a bit of history and direct your anger at the culprits, not the messengers. Medical mismanagement is the issue and always will be.

Appeals to emotion are unfortunately not admissible, especially when the facts are not correct.

Which we know did not happen because post 'pandemic' assessments pointed out that numbers were being fabricated based not on clinical testing confirmation but anecdotal clinical obs. One person, who could not have been healthy, dying a week later does not maketh a fact, period

"And for what it’s worth – if you can provide reliable numbers (regardless of source, as long as the numbers really are reliable*) that vaccine makes one susceptible to the disease people here would listen. So… Got any?" gaist

The Polio plus campaign in India is a classic example of this except they chose to alter the polio diagnostic criteria so you have to call it 'infantile flaccid paralysis'. I have seen it called 'Bill Gates variant polio' which would be rather funny if it wasn't so crap and funded by the public purse.

TB vaccine is another

Whooping cough vaccine is another, instead of admitting outright cause they call it 'vaccine failure' because all those getting it have had the shots up to date.

The acceptable spellings are "tuchis' and "tochis'. Though the etymology traces to Hebrew, the term in original to Yiddish, and thus no transliteration is involved.

I once had a rough idea for a comedy screenplay about an old Jackie Mason-type ex-Borscht-Belt comedian with a Native American grandmother he'd never know who starts to get visions from his Native ancestors in dream-time, has bought some land near a rez and is living as 'an Indian', and causes all kind's of trouble for gambling industry big-wigs trying to expand a casino complex chartered on tribal gaming rights by refusing to sell them his property. I thought his dialog — equal parts Yiddish-hinted English, and Native-American-hinted English, could be a lot of fun. Never did anything with it tough...

"Back up your assertions with actual evidence, the same kind of evidence you demand from us."

And here the merry go round of bollocks begins. I haven't asked you to provide any evidence but I have made comment about the obsession here with medical peer reviewed evidence of the EBM world.

From observation of the state of play, whooping cough vaccine by any other definition of the concept of 'working' is a total year on year failure. Even the CDC admit that it is not non compliance because we have the highest levels of vaccine uptake at the same time as the highest outbreaks. I think you need to explain why you can't see that the whooping cough vaccine is bullshit. We come to flu, each year the 'match is crap' it fails and the excuses pour out.

Vaccination as a project has failed, it only exists in the mind of a by gone era as a success. It is why uptake is questioned by so many, however much emotional blackmail is thrown out there.

What is 'citation required' Julian or is that your standard textbook response? I think you need to get out a bit

Here is a good example of fake peer review by our old friends Merck and Elsevier. There are plenty more, funding your own pharma shill evidence citations. If you can pay for it you can have any result you like. That's the world of pharma. Why should we believe anything else they print?

I can’t believe there is still a small corner of the world that still believes that vaccination is a) science and b)effective.

I can't believe anyone is unaware that the vast majority of doctors and scientists around the world recognize that the evidence for vaccine efficacy and safety is overwhelming and undeniable. Check out vaccine coverage in different countries if you don't believe me. Only a small proportion of children in the USA and other developed countries are unvaccinated. It's you that is part of a small minority of cranks, not vaccine proponents.

WW1 mythology. What was interesting was that the main group of ‘fatals’ was young men 15 to 34 and that was the call up age. Old and young people at home didn’t succumb in nearly anything like the same numbers.

Based on the study reported in August 2009, in more than 85% of laboratory-confirmed A/H1N1 deaths occurred in people under 60 years of age, with a mean age of deaths of 37 years. This is in marked contrast to seasonal influenza epidemics where 90% of deaths occur in people over 65 years and the mean age of influenza-related deaths is estimated at 76 yrs.

I don't think people were overdosing on aspirin in 2009.

We now know that the reason so many died was because of mass aspirin poisoning, between 5 and 35gms to each with a fever.

Where did you get that information? I have seen contemporary documents written by homeopaths that claimed that 100 grains of aspirin (6.7 grams) were given in a 24 hour period, and another that 10 grains (0.7 grams) were given every 3 hours, which is 5.6 grams over the course of 24 hours. Karen Starko's article on the subject (PMID: 19788357) states:

On 5 October 1918, The Journal of the American Medical Association recommended aspirin: “The acetylsalicylic acid may be given in a dosage of 1 gm. (15 grains) every three hours…or a smaller dose combined with 0.1 gm. (2 grains) acetophenetidin, until symptomatic relief is secured”.

I make that a maximum of 8 grams every 24 hours. However, based on contemporary accounts, Starko claims "daily doses of 8–31.2 grams" but she appears to conflate salicin and sodium salicylate with aspirin.

A potentially lethal dose of aspirin is greater than 500 mg/kg, in a 70 kg patient in the region of 35 grams. Continued dosing of 8 grams per day might lead to chronic toxicity but, judging by the 2009 pandemic, the virus alone was quite enough to cause the reported mortality.

‘Back during the H1N1 epidemics’ Hel……
Which we know did not happen because post ‘pandemic’ assessments pointed out that numbers were being fabricated based not on clinical testing confirmation but anecdotal clinical obs.

That isn't true. The WHO reported 16,000 deaths from laboratory-confirmed H1N1 (see my second link above).

One person, who could not have been healthy, dying a week later does not maketh a fact, period

The paper I cited estimated that:

between 7,500 and 44,100 deaths are attributable to the A/H1N1 pandemic virus in the US during May-December 2009, and that between 334,000 and 1,973,000 years of life were lost.

If you disagree, perhaps you might point out the errors in their calculations.

pop socket,
You should really be a bit more critical of the stuff you read on antivaccine websites. This credulous regurgitation of obvious nonsense makes you look like one of those sheeple people keep telling us about.

The Polio plus campaign in India is a classic example of this except they chose to alter the polio diagnostic criteria so you have to call it ‘infantile flaccid paralysis’. I have seen it called ‘Bill Gates variant polio’ which would be rather funny if it wasn’t so crap and funded by the public purse.

If by "infantile flaccid paralysis" you mean acute flaccid paralysis, diagnostic criteria have not changed, but active surveillance now looks for all cases in case they are caused by polio. Polio can be confirmed by laboratory tests, and eliminated as a cause of AFP. There were almost 20,000 cases of AFP in India in 2014, but none were caused by the wild polio virus and, as I already wrote, only two were caused by vaccine derived polio. The remaining cases were due to other enteroviruses, injuries, snakebite and other causes.

Surely any rational person would see that as a triumph for the vaccination program.

By the way, how is Bill Gates' philanthropy funded by the public purse?

pop socket/sock puppet: We have to assume you've got no citations for your outrageous statements.

The WHO has declared India free of endemic polio as of January 1, 2011 and infectious diseases specialists are meeting constantly to decide when OPV vaccine can be discontinued in favor of IPV...after the last case of wild polio in the world has been reported. You're a liar when you claim that the definitions of acute flaccid paralysis have changed. Cases of acute flaccid paralysis are investigated:

You can read it as an opportunity to convert others by showing you are not just taking cues from some random antivaccine site but have actually researched what you speak of, or to tacitly admit that you haven't.

Well, poopster, we asked for substance, and all we get is a lot of hot air and "We don't need no steenkin citations".
Quit contributing to Global Warming and come back when you can support your rant with evidence.

"The Polio plus campaign in India is a classic example of this except they chose to alter the polio diagnostic criteria so you have to call it ‘infantile flaccid paralysis’."

Yeah, just like I'm driving a Lamborghini Countach.

I mean, clearly theyve renamed it as "Kia Sedona", but since the outcome is the same--it gets me from point A to point B along the highway--it must really be exactly the same thing under a different name. Right? [toggle sarcasm off]

"I can’t believe anyone is unaware that the vast majority of doctors and scientists around the world recognize that the evidence for vaccine efficacy and safety is overwhelming and undeniable." Kreb

The reason we are all sick of experts and doctors telling us how to stay well is because their only solution is to take more drugs! They are also paid by the vaccinee, the rate goes up as your practice gets to 90% so that one or two anti vaxxer is stopping you getting the bonus.

I can't believe you think non doctors are such stupid suckers. The cats out of the bag, we don't believe the hype anymore.

'That isn’t true. The WHO reported 16,000 deaths from laboratory-confirmed H1N1 (see my second link above). '
In the context of normal flu outbreaks and in the ocean of world population this is but a blip on the radar. At the beginning of the bullshit expert virologists were telling us the bodies were going to stack up in the street. It never happened buddy.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australasian_Journal_of_Bone_%26_Joint_Med…

This is why no one but doctors on a cheque believe in medical peer review, let's have a comment on the validity of your evidence fabrication buddy.

'Do you think aviation safety is a total year on year failure if even a single accident happens? ' jerk

Nope but a whole cohort of vaccinated kids going down with whooping cough year on year, looks like a plane crash to me buddy, unless you believe in all that vaccine hype. Suggest you change your talisman before your nuts go up

Poland didn't buy into the last flu pandemic and had no more flu than usual. During the year 2000 internet bug scam Italy invested nothing in 'debugging', no planes fell out of the sky. There are lots of good reasons why no one should trust the interlinked industry you cite above. Go look for yourself, that university ed didn't do a whole lot of good for your processes really, did it?

Thank you Calli Arcale, that was a well presented argument. I am tempted to pick at some of your technique but will mainly refrain. However, I must give you a large deduction of points because you were countering “as bad as polio or THE PLAGUE” . You failed to address the plague, and we should just assume your standard Black Death here.

Thank you for the very kind words. ;-) I stuck with polio mostly because of time limitations; it's been a very busy week for me, and plague is a much bigger and more complicated topic. Also, polio is a better analog to measles -- not only is the death rate comparable, but it is also a vaccine-preventable viral disease without an effective treatment for which eradication is within our grasp.

Plague, meaning Yersinia pestis (though the word historically meant other things than just "the Pest"), can be very nasty, and caused some of the worst pandemics in human history. (Note, however, that Spanish Flu killed more in a much shorter period of time; this is probably largely because influenza is far more contagious.) It's still around today, and is actually endemic in parts of the US. People don't realize that, since cases are extremely rare, but that's because avoiding plague is actually fairly easy. Vaccination isn't really an option; a somewhat-effective vaccine was created, but it has some nasty side-effects and was eventually pulled by the FDA. It was created to protect people working directly with Y. pestis or the rodent populations it inhabits. In the US, it is most famously found in some prairie dog towns, and occasionally hikers catch it from them via fleabites. However, basic hygeine, pest control, and trash removal is a good method of controlling the spread of the disease among humans. Trash removal is important because it reduces urban rodent populations.

That's not what I think, however. I think some non-doctors are stupid suckers, not because they aren't doctors but because what they post reveals their stupidity and I also think some doctors are stupid suckers (e.g., cardiologist Wolfson) for the same reason
.

I'm not sure the whooping cough story is often played quite straight. A big reason for its re-emergence is the move away from the whole cell pertussis vaccine, which, as its name suggests, involves use of the complete bacterium.

The old DTP caused quite a lot of fevers and hence seizures, which opportunist lawyers and "experts" such as Mark "I must have missed a zero" Geier claimed led to permanent brain damage.

To get a sense of Dr Geier's incompetence, you might do well to read part of the judgment in the notorious Graham case:

Anyhow, advocates of the whole cell vaccine pointed out that it was unclear what parts of the bacterium were provoking the protective antibodies. And so it proved to be when the newer acellular vaccines came out. Evidently, at least some of the needed epitopes to produce a good level of immunity are possibly missing.

In short, the newer vaccines produce fewer fevers (and hence fewer seizures, which can wrongly be linked to brain damage), but they also appear to be less protective.

So it's likely a more complex story than just denialism behind the resurgence of whooping cough, IMO.

I suspect you are right, the Black Death is a very different beastie because it can be control by other means. Control the Rodents, control the death. We actually did some rescue and recovery work in prairie dog country, so we got versed in plague onset symptoms. After the briefing, there was a pin drop silence until one of the J.O.s asked the obvious question, "Now, why exactly did we pick the one place in America you could get a medieval cluster-foo as our touch zone?"

Short answer: they reformulated the vaccine because of hysteria and ended up with a much less effective one. If people hadn't flipped out over the whole cell, we wouldn't have epidemics now. It's not as effective in adults, but adults aren't in enforced proximity with each other day after day, and they've also managed to figure out hygiene.

Sadmar: I recently had an idea for a children's book. It's about a girl with chemotherapy who wants to go to school, and for her brother to be able to play with other children in an anti-vax community. Said community is so in love with the measles that when she writes a letter to the editor asking people to get shots so she could go to school, her family is forced to move to Canada after they get death threats. (There was also a brief foray as to how things played out for kids and doctors. The kids who are blind and deaf are mocked by their parents, autistic children are kept in attics, and in one case, a doctor in Pakistan, who moved there from the US tells a local that the death threats he gets from some clerics make him feel at home.)

That's what selective reading will do to you. It doesn't offer evidence that seasonal flu vaccination isn't effective, but evidence that in most years it'sbeen very good indeed.

From the telegraph article linked:

The flu vaccine given to millions of people in the UK barely works, health officials have admitted, amid warnings that the number of deaths this winter will be the worst for 15 years.

Why will the number of deaths be the worst in 15 years? Not because flu vaccines don't work as you claim, but instead because in the previous years flu vaccines worked very well indeed--averaging 50% efficacy--and prevented large numbers of deaths from occurring.

Not sure there been a Link here to this: an extended 'web special' of Dr, Jay's interview with Ben Tracy.http://tinyurl.com/q6pe384
He actually says a couple damning things they didn't use in the evening news piece: He admits the majority of his patients are unvaccinated. "I have had many parents tell me they feel their child was harmed by the MMR. I believe them"

But it's just a straight interview with some randomish b-roll. Tracy doesn't come of as aggressive. There's nobody contradicting Gordon... He could appear credible to many in this form. Compare this to the piece that ran on the Evening News, and you'll see how tough that was.

Sock Puppet: Brian Deer is correct about the changeover from whole cell DTP vaccine to the acellular version DTaP vaccine. The acellular version is not as effective, but it does not cause as many febrile seizures...which were the basis for multiple lawsuits from parents who claimed that their children were left with serious degenerative seizure disorders. Those children underwent genetic testing and were found to have a genetic disorder (Dravet Syndrome) with intractable-to-treatment Lennox-Gastaut seizures. (But you know that already because you are *somebody's* sock puppet).

Sadmar, I disagree with your statement about Dr. Jay Gordon not being challenged when he spouts his ignorant anti-vaccine drivel.

- The Respectful Insolence blog and the Science Based Medicine blogs have an exceedingly high impact factor.

- Jay Gordon keeps returning to post on RI and SBM medicine blogs, looking for "approval"...even after he is challenged and called out for his "opinions" which he readily admits are not "evidence-based" and his pandering to vaccine-phobic parents.

- I've ripped into Jay Gordon up, down and sideways every time he returns to Ri or the SBM medicine blogs. I know the games he plays and his faux facade of "civility" which he drops just before he "disappears".

Dr. Tom Jefferson is the head of the seasonal influenza Cochrane Collaboration, who, by his recent interviews and his seasonal influenza reports on behalf of the Cochrane Collaboration, no longer has credibility amongst his peers:

I am SHOCKED SHOCKED SHOCKED to check with the Goggle and discover that the only person using this phrase is Philip Hills playing the different characters in his Dollies' Tea Party, so when he claims to have seen it used, this is essentially a claim that he reads his own comments. So at least one person does.
His family must be so proud of him.

To some extend :-)
Just to elaborate on it (I'm a microbiologist), controlling the rodent population only works if done proactively.

When a black death's outbreak was observed among the rodent population in medieval cities, it was generally too late to do anything about the local rats. Attempts to kill the local rodents actually kickstarted the outbreak among the humans living upstairs: with the rodents' death, the rodents' fleas, which are the vector of the bacteria between rodents and human, suddenly were finding themselves without their usual meal, and they started looking for another source of blood...

Which brings us back on the topic of controlling a disease among a population being easier and cheaper if done by preventing infection rather than by trying to catch-up with an outbreak already at full speed.

'Which brings us back on the topic of controlling a disease among a population being easier and cheaper if done by preventing infection rather than by trying to catch-up with an outbreak already at full speed.'

more weasle words to describe how vaccines fail before during and after an attack. What exactly do you believe in and if so when does it word? herd immunity, well no one is listening, especially all those viruses!

'Dr. Tom Jefferson is the head of the seasonal influenza Cochrane Collaboration, who, by his recent interviews and his seasonal influenza reports on behalf of the Cochrane Collaboration, no longer has credibility amongst his peers:'
pants
Of course he doesn't he has just pointed out that his peers are a bunch of lying toads. Well done Tom, someone has to tell his friends that their breath smells.

@Helianthus Yes, that was advice paraphrased about praire dogs given during the brief. Also my observation about chicken lice, that until you've decided to have a chicken diner you rarely notice the lice.

I'll keep getting the annual influenza vaccine, since I know it will reduce my risk of getting influenza by more than 50% on average. I get it free on the NHS too, since I have asthma, meaning that you pay for it out of your taxes, assuming your clinic makes enough money to pay any, so thanks for that.

So based on a predictive anecdote, you think you have a point to make?

I thought my point was obvious: the reason this year's flu season will be the worstseen in 15 years is because it will be almost, but not quite, as bad as if we didn't vaccinate against the flue this year at all,

So if a homeopathic remedy was 3% effective what would that tell us? If placebo is 20% surely it would be safer and more effective to give everyone a saline injection and tell them they are protected against flu. At least they would avoid all that mercury- oh I forgot, mercury in a vaccine is totally safe - silly me.

This medical peer review is interesting. Anyone who doesn't agree with you has their posts deleted!

So if a homeopathic remedy was 3% effective what would we all say?
Flu vaccine is seven times worse than a placebo. Come on man up and post the critique, all you are doing is validating the slating of shits like you and undermining medicine as a therapeutic.

Good to know that I am not the only one that does not get a case of typo fingers.

In someways, I see this as an extension of "Gresham's law". If you have two circulating strains of flu, one for which you have vaccinated against and one not. At least in the case of the flu virus, the non-vaccinated strain will affect more people, a person will remain infectious longer. Its spread will be more rapid, almost like two substances of different polarity (chromatography). If we were only dealing with human vaccinated populations , eventually the strains we didn't vaccinate would be the only strains left, aka the MRSA plaque. However, flu expands in areas of the world where vaccinations are not so prevalent. Isolated islands might show this effect.

"In someways, I see this as an extension of “Gresham’s law”. If you have two circulating strains of flu, one for which you have vaccinated against and one not. At least in the case of the flu virus, the non-vaccinated strain will affect more people,......."

What a pile of weasle words. If this is the depth of the vaccine narrative it reads like some Organon. Just face up to the fact that vaccines never did and never will rid man of disease. It's embarrassing to read your rhetoric and I, like many others stopped believing in vaccination!

So let's just get this right, flu vaccination's success rests on guess work, if they guess wrong it fails! or the patient is at fault for having some pre existing failure or the virus mutated or the process itself was faulty, or it was a dodgy batch. Why do you accept this crap but not with other therapeutics? Where is the balance in your sense of fact?

It's inordinately funny that you think I am someone called Phillip, you need to sort out your psyops programmer cos that's some wacky guesswork you have there.

"I thought my point was obvious: the reason this year’s flu season will be the worstseen in 15 years is because it........"JVC

Who is predicting this JVC, is this another cornerstone of vaccination - prediction as well as guesswork?
They were stunningly wrong about SARS, avian, swine etc why on earth would the flu Offit soothsayers be right this time. let me guess, all the doctors will now anxious to please be labeling anyone with a sniff as being a flu person because we rely on doctors notifications rather than proper science to tell us it's bad. Geez, it reads like some fairy story with a black ending

" Even Cochrane acknowledges this in this review of controlled randomized clinical trials that included over 70,000 people. ..." kreboizen

35% of the RCT's were industry funded. I have a colleague who used to do this kind of research, when a company wanted to 'test' a vaccine the response was "what result do you want". In a way I am not disputing your quoting K but I am disputing the value of non independent research. Currently Merck are still in the shit over fiddling MMR data and the move to have the case dismissed against them was not allowed. It is highly worrying that the pro vaccine stance here is so dependent on such a dodgy pathway and it is something you should seriously start questioning

"I can’t believe anyone is unaware that the vast majority of doctors and scientists around the world recognize that the evidence for vaccine efficacy and safety is overwhelming and undeniable. ........" K

But doctors are not qualified to comment on research, they are there to just write out the prescriptions. The evidence that you quote is now known to be highly suspect because of industry bias and lack of independent review.

Oh, you have a cure for asthma so I'll never suffer an exacerbation from a respiratory illness.

BTW, those exacerbations occur when I am on controller medication and right before the cold or flu or other respiratory ill my lung capacity is super-normal (usually between 130% and 150% of what it should be).

Of course you'll just say I don't really have asthma or some such as well it can't be asthma just because the lung tests all prove I still have reactive airway issues at 130% of lung capacity and all asthma medications seem to work just fine and it reacts to all the normal asthma triggers.

And some docs are also researchers, I'm lucky enough to see some of those so am I allowed to listen to what they have to say? :-)

Well, poptropica, you really didn't answer the question at all. While I will often cite the lack of scientific method taught to many doctors, the actually quote was "doctors and scientists". When you include "scientist" in there it includes people like my friend that got a Biomedical engineer PhD/MD from Vanderbilt, the biologist, the physiologist, the virologist and lots of "ist" that I've likely forgotten. Not just doctors in "the trenches" but everyone from postdocs studying epidemiology to insurance company statisticians. Imagine a postdoc with the statistics to prove that vaccines are some big scam.

I also can prove by past history. There was a multimillion dollar industry to treat ulcers. The acid suppressants, the surgical repair, the consulting specialist. Then a couple of crazy guys revived an old theory, and put their endodermic lining where their mouth was. Did big bad pharma skeltch the maverick researchers? No, a couple of mavericks overturned the industry because THE SCIENCE WAS THERE! If the SCIENCE was there, the insurance industry, the academic circles, the mavericks would do the papers and the truth would come out.

Per SARS et all. When I started my military service we trained for certain aspects of a limited war with the U.S.S.R. So by your logic, the Soviet military empire was never a threat because they never launched a limited nuclear war? Or Y2K was not a computer problem because things were fixed prior to date.

I know there must be a biological form of "Gresham’s law", I just can't think of what it is called. It shows itself in rapid evolution of herbicide-resistant weeds and MRSA. It could be that Gresham's law really is just a basic principle of evolution and does not have a unique name.

Gresham's law has never been repealed, and showed its face in 1965 and in 1990's when the "State quarters" were minted. Those that forget history are doomed to repeat the course.

" Or Y2K was not a computer problem because things were fixed prior to date." kfc

Well Italy did nothing to prepare at all and nothing happened because it was bullshite. It is kind of addictively fascinating watching all these system geeks strut all worked up about their intellectual fantasies going tits up.
Narad, still to paralyzed to comment on flu vaccine failure instead plumps for weak character comment. So how does herd immunity work for the measles vaccine failure over on your other thread or is that all about non vaxxers?

It is the duty of the ordinary citizen to resist this centralised dictat and rest assured you shall wake every day and read a non believer shoving your medical anecdotes where the sun don't shine, I shіt you not!

Well that's obvious, your continual bleating that vaccine developer can't be wrong, ever, never, is a fairly aimless. When the biggest ever field RCT on TB vaccine shows more people got TB in the vaccined group and last years 96 season study on the flu vaccine by the Cochraine Collaboration, the biggest medical database in the world showed that claims for flu jab efficacy were implausable at best I and many others are stunned at your lack of engagement.

If all they are interested in is overall stats then maybe the fact that Mexico city who had the highest murder rate in the world which plummeted when everyone was told to stay indoors could be claimed to be a vaccine success.

Oddly enough, a trolling sh1tweasel shares the same fixation:
ht_tp://californianssupportingab2109.blogspot.com/2012/07/call-to-action-contact-senate.html?showComment=1345798294621#c380218159249760427

The only positive thing about all this was that Mexico city had one of the highest murder rates per capita than any other city in the world, cos everyone stayed at home through flu fear this murder rate plummeted

Ok you could argue that because everyone in Mexico city was ordered to stay indoors and the murder rate went down dramatically (Mexico city has the highest murder rate per capita in the world) that the vaccine did save lives

Considering, like with all vaccines, there is no long term study (this vax has only been out what 2 or 3 years) to show that the vaccined group against those that don’t have it either prevents mythical HPV pathways to cervical cancer you can’t claim it works either.

Like the way you dropped the flu jab conversation that was showing up your lack of ability to support the mythology of vaccination.

It’s ok for you to have a go at one homeopathic remedy and then imply that the whole of homeopathy is wrong, why is vaccination any different?

"Italy did not prepare at all". So all the old Cobol programs just evolved to be 4 digit compliant? You might mean the federal government of Italy did not make many much effort, not considering that Italy relies upon contractual agreements for most of its big data application.

In the realm of crazy, this is king. There were PLC devices that were not compliant with 4 didget date

digit date encoding. There were billing, utilities, records. These computer systems were not going to evolve, we were not just going to lose the weak to benefit the strong, and they certainly would not develop immunity after the crash. They were fixed ahead of the deadline, some with help from the government, some by private sector. You've really gone into crazy land, King Phillip of Macedonia.

Nice and pretty, not so much, I don't think. Mostly, like, y'know, traumatic.

I was sitting in the computer lab around this time last year, and a colleague started ranting about how "scholarship on Yiddish literature, it is all only trauma, trauma, trauma! I don't even understand all this.... this.... trauma theory!" My friend Vlad was sitting nearby and told her, "You should ask Jamie about it, she's the trauma queen." "Jamie? I do not believe you! She is always laughing!" And I laughed. Really loud.

(This same colleague now, bast a certain point of booziness, often tries to turn her parties into "trauma parties," which she has taken to claiming is old Polish tradition. This is when I typically make my exit.)

So all in all, vaccination discussions don't happen here because none of you seem to read your own peer review citations. No surprise that take up is falling away really.
If you happen to bump into Phillip apologise on my behalf.

King Phillip of Measledonia, I don't see the point you are trying to make. If anything, it proves that charges and claims are reviewed with oversight, and if efficiency was overstated or there was any indication of autism that eventually it will always come out.

Oh it's just come out too that doctors and vaccine manufacturers knew as early as last summer that flu strains had mutated but carried on regardless. So 3% was planned and known way before. On Merck Col Tom, just interesting that this seems not to be on the main news when it's in court especially when it's looking bad for them.

Given how much of Hills' oeuvre can be characterised as "projection", I am worried how he spends his time on the Intertube when he is not spamming skeptic websites. His wife would do well to check his browsing history.

To clarify, that was the only time I'd ever been given anti-virals. I had never been offered them before or after. Also, they are one of the most difficult to swallow pills I ever encountered- try dry-swallowing a triangular pill.

@Lilady Yes, I suspect I was prescribed one of the three standard treatments. I am just, disappointed, with my memory that I can not remember which one. Just as an aside, people with hypercholesteremia like myself sometimes develop plaques in the cerebral arteries also. There is a kind of dementia that can develop. I often worry when I forget something. Having lost parts of my mind during cardiac artery rerouting and rota-routing, I likely pay too much attention to forgetting even the smallest detail.

Back to point. I am not 60 yet, nor was I 50 when I had my breakout. Insurance will not pay for shingles vacc, even with the previous flare-up. My doctor has talked me out of the cost of the shot. That is almost certainly the most profitable tact for the insurance company to take.

I really was convinced that it was a hospital spawned bacteria, I had just gotten some cardiac testing prior to the flare-up so exposure was there. Small painful sores that did not respond to over-the-counter antibiotic cream.

I would like to see a simple statistic re the measles outbreak in disney land world, whatever: of the children/individuals etc that
are fighting measles, what is the percentage of those that were vaccinated? What is that %? obviously a hidden fact, that blows the vaccine movement out of the water! All the studes re new drugs, where is a study/ or studies re vaccines and their adverse effects and their efficacy before "approval"? cite me one study, if you can!!

Col Tom, differences aside why don't you check this short film out showing that most cardiovascular diseases are in effect entry level scurvy. You can do a lot to change your prognosis and start now. Try liposomal vitamin C, you can make your own or buy it. 1gm is equivalent to 10g iv. Good luck.http://www.credence.org/video/heart/
Used to be able to watch this without registering but it is worth the time and you can always insubscribe.

Yes Liz, a stat like that would be very interesting. Why on earth are these stats not collected? Some ethics committee decided that for reasons of cloak and dagger that vaccines could not be tested with a control group of no vaccine because vaccines are supposed to protect and 'not protecting' would be unethical. This is broken logic, the vaccine being 'tested' has nothing to text it against and it assumes, wrongly, that the vaccine already works!

Given that measles is extraordinarily contagious, if the proportion of vaccinated people that were still susceptible were not very very small, we would expect to see thousands, if not tens of thousands, of cases by now (i.e. from the Disneyland outbreak).

Actually, I take additional Vit C, have for the last 40 years. Apparently I must not have been holding my mouth correctly as I still developed heart disease. Increased C does nothing for my HDL, my LDL or any other measurable risk factors. Nor is there any credible studies to link it to changing any labs and only a minor effect noticed in one out of two large studies.

The real shame about being on warafin is that I used to love grapefruits. I remember eating them with my father, peeling and eating them in the chair covered by the hide of the wild nagga. (test your memory for that reference). Before my pacemaker replacement I had to go off the rat poison, and I went to visit my father's bones and eat a grapefruit over the ground that absorbs his last back into creation.

Vitiamin C does not stop heart disease, it is like trying to stop an elephant with pocket knife. To claim otherwise, is to show yourself a fool and liar.

I would like to see a simple statistic re the measles outbreak in disney land world, whatever: of the children/individuals etc that
are fighting measles, what is the percentage of those that were vaccinated? What is that %? obviously a hidden fact, that blows the vaccine movement out of the water!

Actually, no. That "simple statistic" could not tell you anything meaningful by itself.

Suppose you were told that in a particular community, everyone either belonged to the Foo group or to the Bar group. You have no idea what percentage of the population is Foo and what percentage is Bar. If you are given a statistic such as "30% of the money raised by the charity drive was donated by Foos", can you safely conclude "Foos are more generous than Bars"? No, you cannot. If Foos happen to be 30% of the population, that means that Foos and Bars contributed the same amount per person, on the average. If Foos make up 80% of the population, yet they only contributed 30% of the charity totals, suddenly the Bars look like the generous ones. But then the picture changes if we find out Foos are only 2% of the population; suddenly they look amazingly generous!

When it comes to outbreaks, the non-vaccinated are almost without exception the "generous" ones when it comes to giving us disease cases (though it's a generosity no one wants!) Time after time, outbreak after outbreak, the nonvaccinated account for a percentage of the cases that is FAR above the less than 10% they make up of the general population. Do you realize what it means that in some outbreaks, the unvaccinated cases actually do constitute the greater percentage of the total outbreak cases? You have to have a relative risk factor in excess of 500% for that to happen!

Up to about 12% infected may have been technically on schedule, with floating rates of 1 to 3 shots -- 1% had 3 shots. Combined 88% unvaccinated & unknown, with 67% "personal beliefs" exemption status.

What it doesn't tell you is titers before infection of those on schedule, and of course how many exposed that were vaccinated didn't develop symptoms, which you could Ro it from the infected at the 18 exponent.

...and of course how many exposed that were vaccinated didn’t develop symptoms, which you could Ro it from the infected at the 18 exponent.

Indeed you can. Since measles infects 90% of susceptible people exposed, 49 unvaccinated cases means that 54 unvaccinated people were exposed. Since the vaccination rate is about 90%, 54 unvaccinated exposures means that 490 vaccinated people were exposed. Of those, 12 developed measles (if you lump all the vaccinated cases together), meaning that vaccinated people had a 2.4% chance of developing measles, compared to a 90% chance for unvaccinated people.

Arguably, you could support an even lesser chance of developing symptoms -- at 1% if up to date on everything as an adult.

As I said "technically" on schedule, some kids may be on schedule, but at 1 shot, the effect is an avg 93%, the 2nd shot gets you to 97%, and the third to 99%, on avg. So a floating scale, but all the vaccinated adults should be under that typical std deviation percentage 2.4-2.5% for a normal distribution.

Splitting the hypothetical hair.

Also, some may not have the mutation booster from the late 1980's, so that could play a confounding role.

Anyway, that MMWR pretty much puts the writing on the wall for everyone to see the true deleterious community health effect from the "personal belief" exemptions.

Yeah, I thought it was interesting that nearly half of the vaccinated cases had only had one dose - I imagine that population would be quite small, since it would mostly be kids between the first and second doses. That definitely argues for a greater efficacy for the second dose compared to the first. I wish they had also published the vaccination status of the people who were hospitalized, since one of the things antivaxers frequently ignore when arguing that vaccines are useless because they're not 100% effective is that breakthrough infections are generally less severe.

conspiracy theories aside, do you really trust pharmies? who knows what's in the vaccine formulation, really cmon, if you really wanted to control the masses, what better way than thru vaccines?? fear is a great motivator.

During 2011, a provisional total of 222 measles cases were
reported from 31 states (Figure 1). The median age of the
patients was 14 years (range: 3 months to 84 years); 27 (14%)
were aged <12 months, 51 (26%) were aged 1–4 years, 42
(21%) were aged 5–19 years, and 76 (39%) were aged ≥20
years. Most patients were unvaccinated (65%) or had unknown
vaccination status (21%). Of the 222, a total of 196 were U.S.
residents. Of those U.S. residents who had measles, 166 were
unvaccinated or had unknown vaccination status,no deaths were reported. 26% of these cases were vaccinated and yet acquired the virus..

conspiracy theories aside, do you really trust pharmies? who knows what’s in the vaccine formulation, really cmon, if you really wanted to control the masses, what better way than thru vaccines?? fear is a great motivator.

You seem to be having difficulties with the understanding, usage, or both, of the word "aside."

how many people have died from measles ? what is the death rate per 100k?

From Wikipedia:

Measles affects about 20 million people a year, primarily in the developing areas of Africa and Asia. It resulted in about 96,000 deaths in 2013 down from 545,000 deaths in 1990. In 1980, the disease is estimated to have caused 2.6 million deaths per year. Before immunization in the United States between three and four million cases occurred a year. Most of those who are infected and who die are less than five years old. The risk of death among those infected is usually 0.2%, but may be up to 10% in those who have malnutrition.

As for

[W]o knows what’s in the vaccine formulation[?]

Every single medication on the market has to be checked by the FDA. You are beginning to look like a conspiracy theorist.

if you really wanted to control the masses, what better way than thru vaccines??

Actually, scratch the "beginning to look like". You are now in full conspiracy theory mode.

if you really wanted to control the masses, what better way than thru vaccines?

Well, since you ask, I think the following would be better ways to control the masses than through vaccines:
- Political speeches
- Religion
- Appeals to ancient prejudices and hatreds
- Using words to mean something other than their actual meanings in order to trick people into doing what you want

The problem with using vaccines to control the masses is that you've got no end game. Someone gets the vaccine - and s/he is no longer under your control. However, if you work to convince people something untrue about vaccines so that they'll believe your theory about how the government, business, and the medical-industrial complex are trying to control them via vaccines, you can get them to do all kinds of things. Things like, well, donate money. Or write letters to the editor. Or even comment on someone's blog.

Aquino sounds conflicted too. She's certain she is doing the right thing by her children. But when asked how she would respond to parents who might say her unvaccinated children are endangering their children, she swings between angst and reproach.

From my comment 448, taken from cdc site, "26% of these cases were vaccinated and yet acquired the virus.."
If you think you think you're up to it, explain the stat, without diversion, and attacking my intelligence, if you can.

Let's say that 95% out of 100 people are vaccinated. The measles vaccine is 99% effective, which means that slightly less than one person out of the cohort of 95 vaccinated people when exposed to the measles. Let's round up and say one person.

Out of a group of 100 people, we've got 5 measles cases, 1 in a vaccinated person and 4 in unvaxxed people. That already gives us 20% of cases in vaxxed people. Figure in the fact that "vaccinated" could refer to babies who've only received one dose of the vaccine, and you could easily end up with 26% of measles cases in vaccinated individuals.

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Here's a brief update on the move, announced last week.
Things are progressing, and most of my old material has been transferred to the new blog, which is located at respectfulinsolence.com. Of course, there are still some things to tweak and fix, which is why, given how insanely busy this week is…

Well, QEDCon is over, and this box of blinky lights is on its way back across the pond to its home in the US, having had an excellent time imbibing skepticism from its (mostly) British and European partners in skepticism.
Before I left, I made a somewhat cryptic remark about "major changes" to this…

As you probably noticed, I didn't manage a post yesterday. Nor did I manage one today, other than this. That's because I was busy preparing for QEDCon, where I will be on a panel and giving a talk, and, of course, putting together my talk. As I write this, I'm horrendously jet lagged; so I probably…

QEDCon is fast approaching (indeed, I can't believe I have to leave for Manchester tomorrow night), and because my talk there will be about the phenomenon of "integrative medicine," I've been thinking a lot about it. As I put together my slides, I can't help but see my talk evolving to encompass…

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As I write this, I'm told that there are eleven water cannon vehicles heading to the disaster-stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, to attempt to cool down nuclear material that is exposed and exuding (I dare not use the word "leaking" lest I be thought an alarmist) radiation at a rate that seems to be as alarming to the engineers and nuclear experts on the scene as it is assuaging to…

Prepare yourself.
The Te Papa Museum of New Zealand has a new specimen locked in a vault: a colossal squid that will be thawed and dissected (they think!) on streaming video.
Here is the necromantic chamber.
Wait! No protective runes, no array of emergency thuribles, no pentagram, no mysterious idols of jade and obsidian? This may not go well.